Strange Angels
by Vain
Summary: And they all fall down.' While Sam & Dean struggle to find their places in the world and with each other, Castiel & Ruby's reach exceeds their grasp. The results could save-or damn-everyone. Sam/Ruby, Sam/Dean, Castiel/Dean
1. Up From Perdition

**Up From Perdition**  
By: Vain  
9/18/2008

**o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o**

**Standard Disclaimer:** I own nothing except the plot. Supernatural and all the elements therein are the intellectual property / registered trademarks of Eric Kripke and the CW. This is entirely a work of fiction; no profit is being made.

**Summary:** Some souls will be saved whether they want it or not.

**Pairings:** Castiel/Dean & hints of Sam/Dean

**Warnings:** slash, season 4 S.P.O.I.L.E.R.S., un-beta-ed. Please forgive any errors.

**Rated: G**  
**Length:** about 700 words; complete.

**Notes:** This ficlet is all Jekka and Zanzou's fault. And Kripke, because the season premier made plot bunnies explode in my head. This story is the first part of the Strange Angels 'verse.

Originally posted at my LiveJournal.

Plagiarizers will be puppy chow, but reviews rock my salt.

Enjoy!

**o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o**

_H_e whispered in his ear, low and sweet and with the voice of an angel. There, in the darkness, pierced through with metal and alight with pain, the child could hear him and turned his face towards the Eternal. He pleaded for forgiveness then--not for forgiveness from his sins (_so many_ sins)--but for not being worthy.

And Castiel's heart ached for him.

He whispered in his ear, a promise of salvation, and Dean Winchester turned away. He had no context for salvation. No understanding. He turned back down to the Pit and his chains tightened and twisted, lightening dancing over them. He did not believe in salvation.

_He has no faith_, Castiel despaired in his heart.

Around them, Hell yawned and screamed.

He whispered in his ear, a lullaby and a prayer, and the tormented soul shuddered in his bondage and choked out a single plea: "Sammy..."

And Castiel bled for him in that moment because the plea should not have been for an abomination, but for God.

_DeanDeanDeanDean_, he whispered, his voice binding the wretched mortal as surely as those pitiless chains, and Dean screamed.

"SAM!!!!!"

And Castiel caught his lips in a kiss and replaced the false idol's name with His Glory, for an angel can only be glorious. An angel can only be pure. An angel can only be salvation--one way or another. And Dean Winchester's false god could not save him from Hell.

Only the Eternal could do that.

And only Castiel could ascend and bring His Grace to the one place were there is no mercy or salvation.

Dean fought the kiss--fought salvation--like the demon he would one day become if he stayed here.

_SamSamSamSam--_

Tainted and bleeding, stretched thin and tortured, the boy was beautiful for a moment and Castiel hesitated, enraptured by his flaws.

But there is no escape from His Will. Or from an angel's glory. And Heaven would not be denied.

_OursOursOurs_, he countered--_corrected_--with heat and infinite love and pity. And somewhere, deep in the untarnished core of himself, Castiel whispered '_MineMineMine. Mine now._' and laid his hands on the boy.

There was screaming--both from the mortal and from the metal--and Hell shuddered around them as Glory expanded and spread and ripped a gaping wound into the fabric of the nightmare around them. Under his hands, embraced by His Light and cradled by the Eternal, Dean's non-existent flesh puckered and shriveled. His soul writhed and pulsed and pain and hurt poured out him to stain Castiel's essence.

He held on anyway.

_OursMineOurs_ moved through the pitiful thing that was the boy's soul as all the impurities rose to the surface and fought against His greater Glory. It fought _SamSamSam_, choked it, but could not defeat it. Even so, Dean eventually became still and quiet in his hands--smooth and formless like clay, but marred by so, so many imperfections.

"Leave me . . ." the boy pleaded, soul twisted in on itself with the agony of purification.

_Come with me,_ his whispered in his ear then. _DeanOursMineChild, come with me._

"Sam . . ."

Such pitiful resistance.

_I cannot save this one,_ Castiel despaired, knowing that he had to try anyway. _He has no faith. He cannot believe. He cannot **love** . . ._ Could not love anything but the false idol. The Boy King.

But he pulled the boy up from perdition anyway, Dean's tattered soul struggling the whole way. Because he was of the Light and the Glory and such things could not be denied--not even by Dean Winchester.

Hell twisted around them, trying to reclaim its captive even as it tried to vomit Castiel out, but the darkness could not touch them anymore and in his arms Dean burned and glowed like a small sun, a lesser shine lost within his own Glory. And soon the sound of _SamSamSam_ was lost in the roar of the Light and the terror that all mortals must know when touched by the Divine.

_SamSamSam_ was drowned out and Dean's soul distorted and shifted, consuming _Ours_ and _Mine_ until all that left was endless heat and Castiel's terrible, terrible Grace.

_Sleep. No dreams. No pain. No fear. OursMine now. I am here. I won't ever leave. DeanOursMineChild. Surrender._

And then came a soft sweet darkness that felt like Castiel's lips and Light on his skin. And then there was nothing.

Later, in a gas station in Illinois, Castiel would whisper again--salvation, possession, a promise--and Dean Winchester would bleed from his ears and swear he couldn't hear a thing. But when the night became still and quiet and he lay in the dizzy place between sleeping and waking--in the place between what he'd been in Hell and what he was reborn to be in Glory--he would hear a voice whisper low and sweet, '_MineMineMine_.'

And he would know fear.

**o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o**


	2. Intolerance of Ambiguity

**  
Intolerance of Ambiguity**  
By: Vain  
9/27/2008 - 11/10/2008

**o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o**

**Standard Disclaimer:** I own nothing except the plot. Supernatural and all the elements therein are the intellectual property / registered trademarks of Eric Kripke and the CW. This is entirely a work of fiction; no profit is being made. All biblical quotations are taken from the King James Bible and/or the Apocrypha.

**Summary:** Dean may not have faith in God, but Castiel's having trouble having faith in humanity--especially when it comes to one Samuel Winchester.

**Pairings:** Castiel/Dean, Sam/Dean, & Sam/Ruby

**Warnings:** abuse of biblical and religious references, blasphemy, slash of the slashy variety, wincest, implied het, language, all sorts of Season 4 S.P.O.I.L.E.R.S., and a hole in the bottom of the sea.

**Rated: R**

**Length:** about 10,000 words; complete.

**Notes:** This fic is the second in my Strange Angels 'Verse and follows "Up From Perdition;" it takes place after episode 4.07: "It's the Great Pumpkin, Sam Winchester." Hopefully, if I did this right, it will dovetail well with the show. ^^;;  
This took a lot longer to write than I thought it would, but it also ended up being a _lot_ longer than I had intended. I fail at the short story. Sam's POV will be next up in the series.

Beta-ed by the lovely **Jekka**, who keeps me honest. All remaining errors are my own.

Originally posted at my LiveJournal.

Plagiarizers will be puppy chow, but reviews rock my salt.

Enjoy!

**o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o**

_Shall mortal man be more just than God? shall a man be more pure than his maker?  
Behold, He put no trust in His servants; and His angels He charged with folly:  
How much less in them that dwell in houses of clay, whose foundation is in the dust,  
which are crushed before the moth?_

**Job 4: 17-19**

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_T_he coffee burnt the tip of his tongue, a negligible bolt of pain amidst a sea of novel sensations. Pain was easy enough to deal with; pain was a constant in the universe, no matter what your form. But the other trappings of humanity were more difficult to handle. He still had not acclimated himself to taste yet. Touching things had been a bit easier, but tastes still bewildered him a bit. And smells. Smells were all so . . . _thin_ in human perception. The universe seemed to be a less rich place when filtered through meat and water and biochemical electricity. Everything looked different. The colors were less vivid. The air less sharp. Scents were less distinct.

The crush of His Presence within Castiel's mind was less . . . omnipresent.

It was a peculiar feeling.

The angel-made-flesh lowered the coffee mug to the stained Formica tabletop, running his borrowed fingers over the warm, slick ceramic in absent appreciation. Perhaps these entrancing tactile compensations were offered as an apology for being separated from His greater Glory. A poor compensation indeed.

Castiel shifted his shoulders, feeling the fabric of his clothing moving around him. He didn't particularly like clothing--not clothing like mortals wore, at least. It was like wearing two skins instead of one, each chafing and confining him in strange and unfamiliar ways. The actual skin of the vessel was alternatively tight and loose in all the wrong places. He had heard hunters refer to vessels as 'meatsuits' and the irreverent description was painfully accurate; the vessel was uncomfortably heavy and wet around him, lending to a faint sensation of claustrophobia, like being sewn into someone else's carcass. A heart--a solid, living, _human_ heart--thundered loudly in his chest, each beat sending a rush of fluid moving through the purloined body in carefully controlled waves. Air moved into and out of his lungs in quiet, almost unnoticed breezes. The vessel needed to be fed regularly, too. The sensation of viscera working in anticipation was both strangely compelling and repugnant.

These distractions of the flesh seemed to somehow make the Word both more and less accessible.

He had never worn a mortal's skin before and didn't understand how his brethren could have reveled in it at one time. Even now, with such a willing and pious vessel, it was too tight a fit to be comfortable. He could feel his Glory straining to break free--pulsing somewhere on the verge of stretching and bursting--unable to be contained by something as weak transient as flesh and blood and bone. In the corner of his mind, the essence of the vessel slept, shielded from Castiel's Light. His dreams fluttered across the small slice of consciousness they shared--a wife and babe, lost in metal and fire and screaming rubber--three lives cut brutally short, despite the fact that the vessel himself had not been in the vehicle. Though his flesh could (barely) contain the angel, he might not survive Castiel's presence in his body or the work that needed to be done. His soul, pressed so close to Castiel's Light, might well be crushed into oblivion. Castiel knew that the mortal would not mind, though. A part of him--the core of him--had died with the woman and child. There was nothing left for him but to serve the Lord.

At one time, he might have looked upon the human's tragedy with a benign pity. Physically and spiritually removed from the mortal world, angels were also removed from human experience. They looked down on them with the same sad benevolence that the Lord reserved for all his creations, but they were rarely _touched_ but the mortals' struggles. And the few occasions that they when they were touched--the Israelites' struggles in Egypt, Elijah's suffering in the dessert, and (more recently) the Winchesters' increasingly futile battles against the rising darkness--it was usually because the struggle was so great and of such import that the Lord Himself was moved and there simply _had_ to be an intervention. The simple death of a wife and daughter, however, was not enough to move an angel--especially not a hardened soldier like Castiel.

At least, it shouldn't have been. But now, clothed in human flesh, a human heart beating and bleeding in his stolen human chest, it _was_. He felt sorrow for the mortal he inhabited--empathic in a way that something Divine rarely knew. And he couldn't help but wonder if _this_ was the reason the Eternal made part of Himself as a Man--to know the fallibility and the exquisite contradiction of strength and frailty that was the human condition.

He also couldn't help but wonder what lesson _he_ was supposed to glean from all of this. His mission here on Earth was multi-faceted. Watching over the Child was only one part of it all and it was His Grace that selected and offered up Castiel's current vessel to the angel. The Lord then, also had to know what being ensconced in flesh would do to him--how it would affect him and invest him in humanity.

It was strange and uncomfortable to feel with a human's emotions, even if it was only a shadow of the bonds the vessel had once known. Affective evaluations colored everything he saw, everything he knew. Even his own memories were touched--_contaminated_--with the slow spread of mortal emotions.

It made him feel unclean.

Despite his distaste for the inane complexities of the human process, taking a vessel was undoubtedly the wisest choice. He was too close to the mortal world right now to remain in his true form--the psychic woman was evidence enough of that. He'd warned her not look upon his face, but she hadn't listened. It was a defiance for which she had paid a heavy price and soft regret lingered within Castiel at the thought of her.

No. A vessel was much better. Especially because the Child would not heed his calls.

. . . No. Could not _understand_ his calls.

That knowledge was still surprisingly bitter. Either the Child had much farther to go than Castiel had feared or Hell had damaged him more than the angel had thought. It was most likely too much to hope that, despite everything--despite his sins and fears and petty self-loathing and doubts--Dean Winchester would be one of those blessed by Sight. The Child's mind was not open to such things; he clamped down on everything precious within him for fear of being no different than the things that had destroyed his life and family. He feared being distinguished by his own merits--even now, years after his father had died and he had ceased to be the lynch pin holding their unsteady little family together--he shied from anything that might rattle the dynamic he shared with the people important to him.

It was such a waste, but it was also no surprise that the boy continually lashed out whenever Castiel was present. Not that they made the Child's tantrums any easier to handle. There were very few things that Castiel could not handle gracefully, but Dean Winchester in a fit of pique seemed to be one of them. Even while learning to navigate these unfamiliar human emotions, he shouldn't let the eldest Winchester boy provoke him again. It would be counter productive if the Child feared him. Dean had a tendency to try to avoid or kill the things he feared. Neither of those potential reactions sat well with Castiel. It wasn't as though the Child could harm him really, but somehow the idea of direct conflict between them . . . _vexed_ him. And he didn't particularly want the boy to harm _himself_.

_Mine._

What would be the point of dragging him out of Hell if Dean were to just self-destruct again?

The angel sighed, moderately irritated by his line of thought. He wanted Dean to accept the Lord and serve the Host of his own volition. He wanted the man to fight with and for them not just willingly, but eagerly. Like he did for his father. Like he did for the Boy King--for Samuel. But there were other members of the Host who, like Uriel, were not as discriminating. It wouldn't matter to them if the Child bowed willingly or was forced to bow, so long as the work was completed.

Two millennium of watching humanity tear itself apart without Divine intervention had jaded many members of the Host. Humanity had been permitted to write their own history and they had written it in blood; there were few left who regarded their once-and-former charges with the affection they had once held. They had seen too much--knew too much about the nature of the Lord's Earth-bound children.

Sin stained everything and virtue was nothing more than a dying spark in the coming darkness. There was so little true innocence left in this world. The Lord had been forgotten--lost amidst split atoms and torn DNA. In many ways, Dean Winchester epitomized his age: he did not lack for attempts at virtue, but he had _no faith_. No hope. He fought--raged against a darkness that he could only understand in terms of the mundane and immediate losses and concessions--but he did not do it for the sake of virtue or the Lord. He did it because he didn't know how to do anything else. He was driven by rages and lusts and fears and hungers, drowning in chaos and unable to see the lifeline held out before him. Just like most of the other members of his species.

They were all so far from the Lord and each other. Each all alone in a sea of faces.

It frustrated Castiel. It made him ache.

No wonder they worked so hard to ignore the signs of the Divine around them--nothing was free in the human world. Nothing good, anyway. Being able to understand that now did not make it any easier to accept.

_"I pulled you out of hell. I can throw you back in."_

And the Child had believed him. He'd been almost _eager_ to believe him--to find the catch, the fine print, of his salvation. Even now, having been bathed in Radiance, branded with Castiel's mark, and raised up from perdition, Dean still averted his face from salvation.

He wondered how a stronger member of the Host--Gabriel or Raphael--would have fared against Dean Winchester. Perhaps Jeremiel would have been a better fit for this mission; he was more familiar with the ways of the flesh and mortals' quicksilver emotions. He would not have been so quick to anger.

But Castiel couldn't quite bring himself to regret his time here on Earth. It was precious--a gift. And he had voluntarily shouldered this burden and Dean Winchester along with it. He would bear both gladly in service to the Lord.

Besides, he couldn't blame the Child for being afraid. Dean did not understand anything outside of his own realm of experience and his experience seemed limited to one thing and one thing only: Samuel.

The Child's stubbornness should not surprise him. Dean had rejected salvation in Hell, after all. He had begged for Samuel--Samuel, who fornicated with demons while his brother burned--and turned his face from God's glory towards the Pit.

So no. Dean's refusal to believe didn't surprise him.

_No context,_ he reminded himself as he clutched at the coffee mug. The Child had no context for anything outside of his brother. And it grated on Castiel. It made his borrowed stomach twist and sour.

Wrath. A sin of the flesh, however justified.

It was blasphemy, sin, and sacrilege all rolled into one, but Dean's relationship with his brother could not be interfered with too much. They were too close--too . . . bound to one another. Castiel resented it but he recognized it, even if some of his brethren did not. Dean could not be forcibly removed from his brother's side. It would foster too much rage and resentment on the elder hunter's part. It was better to try and save the boy and win the Child's favor through that means. Dean might even accidentally save himself in trying to save his brother.

In any case, he would never abandon Samuel. If nothing else, his perseverance in this last task had proven that. A lesser (or perhaps, better) man would have walked out on Samuel by now, but Dean remained steadfast. It was one of the pitfalls of selecting someone like the older Winchester for such work, but true martyrs were hardly a dime a dozen. And Dean's soul had been purged in hellfire, tempered in sacrifice, and sanctified by Castiel's own hand and the Word of the Lord. He'd been made into a weapon--hardened and true. There was no better choice.

For the moment, then, Samuel Winchester was just a cross they would have to bear. And if the boy could not be saved . . . If Lilith fell and the Boy King rose in her stead . . . Well, they had Dean after all. And eventually the Child would come to understand that he didn't really need Samuel anymore; he had Castiel. He had the Lord. He wasn't alone anymore and never would be again if only he would bend that proud neck to God's Glory.

The only problem was that Castiel was not so sure that Dean would ever bend his neck. He wasn't sure that Dean _wanted_ to be saved--that _humanity_ wanted to be saved. It was easy for demons to tempt mortal men to sin, but how could an angel tempt a mortal to virtue? Especially when sin shared the bed with comfortable, more-than-fraternal familiarity?

Castiel's hands gripped his coffee mug so forcefully that a tiny crack appeared at the lip of the porcelain. He forced his grip to relax a bit.

He didn't know about the rest of humanity and he didn't know about the dark and danger-fraught path Samuel Winchester was dragging them all down. But he did know that he was not prepared to abandon Dean yet. He was a soldier; he was used to fighting, and his fights were only virtuous. Even clothed in human skin, Glory smothered by a thin veneer of mortality, an angel can only be virtuous. The _Lord_ can be only virtuous.

He'd dragged Dean Winchester clawing and fighting from Hell. If need be, when the time came, he would not hesitate to drag him up to Heaven too, Boy King or no.

The soft squeak of tennis shoes on stick tile roused him from his unhappy thoughts and the angel lifted his eyes to see the waitress approaching with order. She was a a reasonably pretty woman, gracefully entering her mid-thirties, but he smile did not quite touch her eyes and there were deep lines etched in her face--evidence of the silent burden she bore. Her name was Anne, but she went by Emma in this town. She'd chosen it because Emma wasn't the kind of person who would have run out on her children and left them with an abusive husband who had liked the bottle and the belt more than his wife. Emma was not the type of woman who could barely make rent, even in a podunk strip of bad road like this. Emma was a fun person. A good person.

Anne was not.

Emma set the plate down and continued smiling, the expression not at all reflective of the misery he could read in her eyes. Castiel cocked his head to the side at the apparent dissemblance. If he couldn't see into her soul, he might not have ever guessed at Anne and the thirteen years of bruises and broken bones Emma's smile hid.

"Do you need anything else, sir?"

It was instinct that moved him--instinct born of pity. His hand snaked out quickly--perhaps more quickly than a human hand should move--and she gasped as he gripped her wrist firmly, but gently. She tried to pull back, but he tugged her arm so that she met his eyes again. Her face was pale and frightened at the sudden movement.

"Go in peace," he murmured for ears alone. And a whisper of Grace moved through her, soothing the festering wounds on her soul, even if it couldn't heal them completely.

Her eyes widened in she shivered slightly and he released her, strongly resisting the urge to wipe his hand on a napkin. The woman rubbed her wrist and nodded dumbly as she backed away. He knew without looking at her again that she would be going to church tonight, but he couldn't feel any victory in his actions. She was only one soul and the darkness was fathomless, even to one such as him.

Castiel pursed his lips unhappily and stared down at the greasy food on his plate, appetite gone. He picked at the fries for a moment and prodded the cheeseburger with one of them, poking back the sesame bun to reveal bacon, lettuce, tomato, pickles, ketchup, and extra onions. How the Child managed to live on food like this without harming himself was a mystery.

This cheeseburger, though--its greasy appearance notwithstanding--was actually very good. If nothing else, the vessel's stomach seemed to approve and Castiel had made it halfway through the burger before he even realized how hungry he was. Hunger was another sensation that was still novel and it was generally unappreciated. Hunger and exhaustion tended to interfere with his work, but the vessel could not be neglected either.

The two men arrived shortly after Castiel had polished off the cheeseburger and moved onto the fries. Even if the bell attached to the diner's door had not jangled loudly when the taller of the two entered the diner, the angel would have been aware of their entrance. It was something akin to feeling an electrical storm coming overhead. And--if the look on Samuel's face was any indicator--the storm had arrived.

The younger Winchester was scowling ferociously, as though he'd bitten into something extremely sour and could not rid himself of the taste. His gait was swift and firm, aggressive and hostile. Dean entered closely at his heels, barely a foot away, but seemingly miles behind him. His face was set in an aloof, tired mask of indifference, but his eyes were bright with exhausted frustration.

There was a distance between them now, noticeable because of the subtle _offness_ of it all. Castiel had watched them before Dean's damnation, of course. The Winchesters had always been of particular interest to the Host--all of Azazel's children were. And Dean had always seemed to warrant watching from those angels still interested in human events. He was . . . interesting. Castiel knew of the brothers' strange synchronicity; it was a product of both their sin and their curious upbringing. They had moved together like a piston--two separate parts working seamlessly together to create a functional whole. But that had been before Dean had gone to Hell to be torn and twisted and reborn in Grace and Samuel had descended into darkness and taken to bedding a demon in his brother's place.

Now their smoothness was gone--disjointed. They were an unlubricated joint, chafing and reluctant. Dean held himself in hard lines and distressed reservation where his body language had previously always been open and attuned to his brother. And Samuel hovered in angry agitation, always reaching towards the smaller hunter, only to shy back at the last moment and never touch him. They did not turn together anymore, but rather in opposite directions and always in sharp little jerks, as though each was attempting to fight his brother's gravitation pull. The frayed and desperate edges of their relationship were evident in the unhappy body language as they circled one another in a continually decaying orbit.

He wondered what would happen when the two of them finally collided.

He wondered how much of it was his fault.

_"Stop him. Or we will."_

He couldn't bring himself to regret it. All that had happened was in accordance with His Will and the will of the Host.

Emma bustled over to the two men and escorted them to a booth three seats down and at an angle from Castiel's own seat. Dean slid easily into the narrow space with a fake smile and a wink and sat with his back to the angel, facing the door. Samuel folded himself into the space across from his brother and offered Emma a thin, tired smile.

Castiel was hardly worried about them seeing him--even clothed in skin, humans could only see him if he wanted them to. It was a trick he had used to monitor Dean multiple times, much like now. It wasn't that he became invisible--the eye just slid past him and the mind dismissed him as unimportant. It was a curiously simple trick to pull these days, even among the faithful; all he had to do was _shine_ a bit. In the old days, people were not willing to be so dismissive of a hint of divinity.

"You boys want anything to drink while you check the menu?" the waitress chirped, eyes still fixed on Dean's falsely blinding smile.

"Two coffees and a Coke," Samuel grated a bit harshly.

The tone earned him a flat look of warning from Dean and a slight start from the waitress.

Her smile slipped a bit. "Of course. I'll be right back."

Dean waited until she was gone to castigate the other man. "Dude? What the hell?" His tone was heavy with fatigue--_Still not sleeping well_, the angel realized--and irritation.

Instead of flinching or shrugging at the sharp question as he might have done once, Samuel merely met his gaze levelly. "What?"

Castiel stared at that cold, hard gaze and saw shadows crawling behind the human's eyes. He had seen them there before, of course, back when he had shaken the child's hand in the dim, yellow light of their cheap motel room. The Boy King's skin had been dry and cool against his palm--so unlike what

Castiel had imagined. It didn't at all hint at the firestorm raging within the boy. Then, eagerness and a gratitude so poignant it had been tangible had obscured everything else and the tiny, flagging light in Samuel's soul had shown forth through the smothering darkness. It was that light that was attached to Dean and in that moment it had glittered like a single star in the darkness. Now, though, it was nowhere evident. Now, there was nothing but darkness and hints of sulfur, power churning itself up inside the boy like an inferno--like a sickness, even if it didn't yet spill out.

The sight--the _feel_ of the boy who would-be King so close to him and his charge--made the angel want to spread his wings and open his true mouth to establish authority. Establish ownership.

Instead he took a sip of coffee that had long-since gone cold.

Dean shook his head after a beat of silence and buried himself in the syrup-sticky menu as though it was the most engrossing thing available, never mind the mystery that his own brother was currently presenting. From his seat, Castiel could see Samuel draw his lips into a thin, tight line, jaw clenching in an expression that clearly conveyed obstinacy. For a moment, it looked like he would pursue the argument, but then the waitress returned, coffees and Coke carefully balanced on a tray in one hand and creamer in the other.

Samuel swung his flat gaze to her and the expression softened a bit. Castiel, though, could still see darkness festering inside him. "We're actually ready to order." His smile looked like an apology.

The angel had not been to visit the Child since their time in the park--since Uriel had had his own words with the younger Winchester--so he wasn't yet sure precisely what accord the two hunters had struck regarding the use of Samuel's powers or the angels' warnings, but it was evident that neither of them was completely pleased with the arrangement. Dean still had a jumpy air about him, as though unable to fully shake the unease recent revelations had fostered. And Samuel . . . was much more difficult to read. He did however know that boy had not used his abilities again, however temporary that might be. The visits with the demoness continued, though.

That was a mixed blessing. On one hand, Ruby was an unknown factor; despite the fact that she seemed more helpful than hurtful to the brothers, even taking her demonic nature into account, that she had encouraged Samuel to use his powers at all was troubling beyond measure. On the other hand, however, Castiel knew that it was Ruby's lingering, invisible presence that was preventing Dean from taking his brother back into his bed. That was most definitely something to be encouraged.

The Winchesters' . . . involvement with one another was beyond difficult. Two men laying together . . . two _brothers_ . . .

Even angels averted their eyes from such sins.

_Abomination_, he reminded himself as he watched the two hunters receive their coffee and place their orders.

_'If a man also lie with mankind, as he lieth with a woman, both of them have committed an abomination: they shall surely be put to death; their blood shall be upon them.'_

When looked at objectively, the Child's carnal sins were not any less acceptable than the dozen other sins he somehow managed to commit on a weekly basis. In the grand scheme of things love--when it _was_ an issue of affection and not lust--was not the worst of the sins. However, when taken in context, Samuel and Dean as SamandDean was . . . problematic--not merely because they were men and not merely because they were brothers, but also because of _who_ they were. Samuel was the winner of Azazel's unhappy lottery: the potential Boy King of Hell--vanguard of the Apocalypse. And Dean . . . Well, Dean had a different kind of potential--a potential that might well place the brothers Winchester on opposite sides in the coming war.

As things stood now, with Samuel and Dean bound together so closely, it did not bode well. Just as the Host hoped that Dean's ties to Samuel would draw the younger Winchester away from his dark destiny, so too did the Hell's denizens hope that Samuel would draw Dean back into the darkness that had once tried to swallow him whole. Standing together, the Winchester brothers seemed near-invincible. Separated, though, and each aching for the other every step of the way . . . Well, it was too uncertain.

The issue would have to be addressed eventually and yet Castiel shied away from the matter. It was too . . . _sticky_. Especially with the hunter torn between refusing to believe out of spite and needing to believe out of fear. Castiel wanted Dean to come to them willingly, or not at all. So on this matter--the issue of wandering hands and unnatural fraternal familiarity--the angel would keep his peace. For the moment. Even though he knew how the two men craved one another, even as they denied each other.

The Lord was not without mercy, but His Will was absolute.

What the Winchesters had needed to end, and it was better that they ended it themselves without his intervention. There was no reason to give Dean more cause to resent him and attempt to defy the Lord. In all Creation, there was only one being who had ever truly defied the Almighty: the Lightbearer. And, while Dean was special, he was not _that_ special.

Samuel, on the other hand . . .

Emma bustled away with a slightly more subdued smile than the one she'd initially directed at Dean when then the hunter completed placing their order. Dean tilted his head and leaned out of the booth slightly to stare after her and it took Castiel a moment to realize her was watching the sway of her body as she walked away.

Castiel sighed in exasperation and nibbled on a ketchup-laden french fry. _Lust._

He wondered if Dean Winchester had some sort of skill for cycling through all the Seven Sins in one week or something. And how had the human's penchant for sin become a source of fond exasperation? At least that vaguely hungry and crudely appreciative gaze was not being leveled at the man across the table from him.

Samuel watched his brother's gaze and snorted lightly, a slight frown twisting his lips. "You're such a pig." There was fondness in the chastisement, but it was slightly overshadowed by genuine irritation.

Dean shifted back into the booth and Castiel wished that he could see his face for a moment as a beat of awkward silence settled between them. Then Dean shifted in his seat again, pleather squeaking slightly. "Don't be jealous 'cause I got game, man," the older man retorted easily.

The words, the brotherly banter, was all the same, but the emotion fell flat between them, lingering like an unpleasant smell. They were playing at sincerity--trying to ignore the issue that sat heavily between them. Dean was clearly trying to avoid the problem of his brother's powers by ignoring it. It wouldn't work, of course, but denial was an important and necessary stage of grief, and grief was an important and necessary step towards letting someone go.

Samuel's reticence to broach the issue confused the angel, though. The only thing he had to lose was a measure of Dean's faith in him. Was that really so important to the Boy King? Especially when he had Ruby waiting in the wings? The answer was evident in how he could not quite meet Dean's eyes.

The angel prodded at a french fry on his plate. Honestly, he would rather avoid the whole sticky matter of Samuel Winchester's benighted soul altogether. Samuel was complex and not at all how Castiel had expected him to be. He was hardened, but lurking beneath it all was a surprising core of innocence and a desperate need to believe in just a merciful God. He still prayed--prayed with his whole heart, which seemed to be a rarity for mortals these days--but he did not _submit_. He had faith, but not _trust_. He, like his brother, was a child of God--and a far less trying one, at that; he didn't deserve his potential fate.

But Dean, not Sam, was the Host's primary concern. Castiel's duty--his burden--was to protect the human and prepare him for the tasks to come. He wasn't sure how to navigate between the two of them.

_Someone better should have been chosen for this._

Or--more accurately--perhaps he should not have been so eager to volunteer.

Because more and more--pound for pound, soul for soul--Samuel and Dean seemed to be a package deal. And there was no room for anyone else when it was the two of them. Not for Lucifer and not for God. And where did that leave Heaven and Hell and the impending call of Tel Meggido?

Where did that leave Castiel?

Somehow, that thought disturbed him more than anything.

Samuel cleared his throat and slouched in the booth, making the seat squeak in protest. "So what were you going on about this afternoon?"

Dean took a swig of coffee that seemed to be more of an inhalation than an actual drink. From his perspective, Castiel could see the diner's too-bright florescent lights shining off the man's dark blond hair, turning it a strange greenish tint. "Job," he quietly grunted in response as he set his mug on the table again. "There's a vamp in Tulsa and rumor of a dead schoolteacher outside of Detroit."

Their voices were a low murmur and would have been indecipherable to anyone else, but Castiel's ear picked up on them easily. There were few secrets that the Winchesters held that he could not ferret out.

Samuel quirked an eyebrow, a skeptical smile tugging at his lips. The half expression was eerily similar to Dean's when the Child was uncertain whether or not he should be smiling. Castiel hid from the resemblance by eating another fry. It was strangely tasteless in his mouth.

"You're excited over a fang and a salt and burn? That's kind of . . ." he paused, as though hunting for an inoffensive word, ". . . pedestrian by our standards these day. What's the catch?"

"I'm excited over a _hunt_," the smaller man corrected. "C'mon, man. A clean kill--no lines, no waiting, and no fine print. This is exactly what we need, Sammy. And it feels like forever since I got to decapitate or incinerate something."

Coming from anyone else, that statement might have been disturbing. From Dean, it was merely a bit bemusing, particularly when Castiel could _hear_ the grin in the other man's voice.

Samuel seemed to share his opinion because the taller human merely shook his head with a grin and took a sip of coffee. "Decapitate or incinerate? Pulling out the two-dollar words tonight?"

Whatever retort the other man might have made was swallowed when Emma returned with their plates. Her voice was full of false cheer as she arranged the food--a cheeseburger and a turkey club--in front of the two men. "Would you gentlemen like anything else?"

Dean shifted forward, his body language too familiar and vaguely predatory even when seen from behind. "What kind of pie do you guys have . . . Emma?"

She blushed. It was a much different flush than she'd had when Castiel had touched her. "Lemon meringue. Though it might need to chill a little longer; it was just baked fresh this afternoon, too."

"Two please," he asked with a grin Castiel couldn't see coloring his tone. "When it's ready."

She blushed and nodded before departing again, a noticeable spring in her step.

Across the table Samuel made a sour face at his brother. "You know I hate meringue," he chided.

"Who said you were getting any?" Dean countered immediately as he upended seemingly half a bottle of ketchup over his plate.

Samuel snorted. "Again: _pig_."

Despite the taller man's words, Castiel knew from previous observations that Samuel would end up peeling the fluffy white layer off one of Dean's slices and eating half of the thick lemon custard below it, but the brothers always seemed to have the same exchange whenever Dean ordered that particular type of pie.

"Anyway," the younger hunter quietly continued as he disassembled half his club to scrape off the mayonnaise, "you had yourself a regular bonfire on Halloween. I had to use half a thing of that floral bleach crap to get the reek of funeral ashes out of our clothes."

"Yeah . . . Well . . ." Dean avoided his brother's gaze, hunching over slightly as he poked at the fries on his plate, "that was Halloween and Halloween's over. I wanna raise some hell."

It was a poor choice words because Samuel's face twitched towards a frown. His toasted bread crunched slightly as he pressed the sandwich together again. "You sure your heavenly helpers aren't going to be pissed at you?"

Castiel frowned at the line of inquiry and made a note to have words with Uriel again. It had not been the archangel's place to try to drive a wedge between the brothers. The Winchesters were in God's hands--the Host only served as a proxy in this--and, while Uriel might outrank Castiel in the field, they were all equal before the Lord.

Besides, where Dean Winchester was concerned, _no one_ in the Host outranked Castiel. The others would do well to remember that.

"Screw what they think," Dean ground out flatly. "Uriel was out of line back there."

"And _Cas_?" There was a hint of mockery in the inflection.

Mustard was added to the puddle of condiments Dean had created, and his tone was guarded as he spoke. "What about him?"

"Is he really alright with you calling the shots like that?" Samuel jabbed a french fry at Dean, waving it towards his right shoulder. "I mean, he seems to have some sort of stake in you now, right?"

"He's not my keeper," the older man responded with obvious irritation. "If something needs to be done, he asks--"

"He _tells_ you, Dean," the younger man interrupted sharply. He took a savage bite of the french fry. "This is the same guy who threatened to send you back to Hell if you didn't toe the line, remember? Comparatively a little on the short side? Blue eyes? Holier-than-thou attitude? Kind of a mud monkey-smiting dick?"

Dean slammed the bottle of mustard onto the table with far more force than necessary. "It isn't always like that. You just met him." It had the feeling of a well-worn protest.

Samuel ignored the bulk of the protest. "Anyway, _you're_ the one who said he was a dick." The retort seemed more mature than it should have when delivered in that calmly logical tone. "And what was with the whole Samhain seal thing anyway? You say the word and they shuffle away with their wings between their legs? The whole thing feels funny."

"What do you want me to say, man?"

"I'm just saying that I don't buy all of this 'What Would Dean Do,' personal Jesus stuff. How do we know they aren't setting you up for a fall?"

Dean was quiet for a moment, head lowered as though he was staring at his plate. Or praying. Castiel found the former more likely. The silence stretched on for a long moment, longer than was comfortable, before the elder Winchester finally replied. "Castiel isn't like Uriel."

Samuel jerked his head back slightly, as though flinching away from something. His forehead wrinkled slightly as he pulled a face, incredulity warred with anger for a moment before he settled on flat-out disbelief. "Come again?"

"Cas . . ." Dean shrugged and he sounded vaguely confused. "He's not like Uriel. We talked afterward, remember? He showed up when I went to the park."

"I thought you talked about the seal?"

"We _did_. . ." Dean's voice was a strange mixture of exasperation and guilt. It was strange, but Samuel seemed to be able to pull every emotion imaginable from his brother with the barest change of inflection, but all Castiel seemed to inspire was hostile resignation.

_Envy._

It was a sin.

Dean continued, oblivious to the frown that now marred his unseen watcher's face. "But we talked about other stuff too, though. He's not all 'kill 'em all' like Uriel, okay?"

Samuel put his sandwich down and settled back in the booth. He leveled a flat glare across the table at the other man and his voice was clipped as he spoke, "You didn't tell me that."

"I gotta tell you everything now?"

"What did you two talk about?" he bit out.

_Envy_, Castiel thought again. The internal admonition should have had more power over him than it did.

_Jealousy_, his vessel's memory whispered.

There was a difference in there, but he couldn't quite see it.

"Faith, man." Dean's voice came out sounding hollow and tired and he too settled back in his seat. "It was kinda personal."

"Personal?" The incredulity was back in Samuel's voice now, tinged with something more. Something dark. "You're getting 'personal' with an angel now, Dean? Was it personal for you, or personal for him?"

The tone of his voice made Castiel's borrowed skin crawl.

"Don't be like that!" Dean snapped in a low tone while the angel tried to restrain his urge to intervene and remove Dean from the darkness looming before him. "I _can_ have conversations with people who aren't you, you know. It's not like you don't do the same thing."

Samuel's expression went completely flat as the barb landed and the conversation suddenly fell flat between, as though Dean had somehow exposed something obscene. And really, Castiel knew, he kind of had. For a long moment, the two brothers merely stared at one another in silence, the air thick with tension. Then, by some unspoken agreement, they both looked away and devoted their attention to their food.

By the time Emma returned with the pie, their meals were half gone and the tension seemed twice as thick. Castiel swept a cold french fry through spilled salt on his plate and watched with interest as the waitress smiled tentatively at Dean.

"Do you need anything else, sir?"

She blushed again when he turned to look at her and Castiel wondered at the reaction.

"We're fine, darlin'. Just the check, please." His gentle drawl seemed thicker than usual.

Crimson-cheeked and smiling, she tore a piece of paper off her pad and placed it face down on the table. "Please let me know if you need anything else."

The Child watched her appreciatively for a moment as she swayed away again and then picked up the bill. "Dude. Free pie. I am awesome."

Samuel sighed quietly and looked up from the wreckage of his sandwich. For a strange moment, he seemed to be all large, sad eyes and loose, floppy hair. Castiel blinked and looked for darkness in his eyes. "Dean . . ."

He couldn't see any.

"Christ, Sam," Dean groaned in response. He rubbed a hand over his face tiredly and stole a long drink from the other man's Coke. "Let it go."

". . . I'm just worried about you, okay?"

The half-empty glass was set back on the table between them. "Not your job."

That earned him another sour look as Samuel's forehead wrinkled and his lips puckered slightly.

Dean ignored the expression with his typical aplomb by stuffing four french fries in his mouth at the same time and then chiding him with his mouth full. "And stop making that bitchface at me, Sammy."

The taller human rolled his eyes, apparently choosing his battles. "Listen--no, _Listen_ to me, Dean," he pressed when the other man made an unhappy noise. "You . . . Sometimes you . . . _like_ people a little too fast, alright? For the wrong reasons."

Castiel watched the line of the Child's shoulders stiffen. "Excuse me?"

Samuel ignored the question, choosing instead to splay his hands on the table in front of him in an obvious entreaty to be heard. "How do we even know these guys are _really_ from God?"

"I know, okay?" Dean bit out. "Now can we please drop this so I can finish my pie in peace? Please?"

"No. You've been putting this conversation off for too long."

Dean made a gesture encompassing the diner. "And now strikes you as a good time for this?"

"When you won't cause a scene or drive us into a ditch? Yeah, I'd say my timing is pretty damned good."

They glared at one another across the table for a moment. They'd been keeping their voices low and hadn't attracted any attention thus far, but all it would take was one of Dean's bouts of snappish temper to turn every head in the place and Castiel knew that as well as Samuel did. He also knew that--for all his bravado--the Child didn't care for people prying into his affairs and Dean wouldn't willingly cause too much of a scene. Nor would he abandon his brother in some random diner. He almost admired the human's manipulation, actually.

"How do you know, Dean?" Samuel pressed after several moments of tense silence. "How do you know these things are doing the right thing here? How do you know they're not just using you?"

Dean sighed and turned his head to look out the window. ". . . He's an _angel_, Sam."

A look like pity flashed over Samuel's face, but was gone by the time Dean turned back. "Yeah. And a lot of demons used to be angels, too."

"Castiel is not Fallen."

Castiel was strangely warmed by the flat certainty in Dean's voice, even if the line of this conversation had only served to further unsettle him.

Samuel shook his head. "Maybe not, but he's not like any angel I've read about."

"Then you've never read Revelations," the elder man snapped sharply.

"And you have?"

Dean shoved his plate away, a clear indicator that he'd been pushed too far. "I know my job, Sam. You think I'm just taking this all at face value? You think I'm that dumb?"

"That isn't what I meant--"

"Screw this," the elder hunter snapped, reaching for his jacket.

Samuel watched him with an expression of profound displeasure. "So now what? You're Dean Winchester: the Pointy End of God's Big Stick?"

Dean paused in his search and when he turned back to his brother, there was acid in his voice. "I dunno. Doesn't sound too far off from 'Boy King,' now does it?"

Samuel's eyes narrowed, but he didn't flinch. "Maybe not, but do you see me leading an army of demons anywhere? These . . . things . . . the angels. . . . We shouldn't be messing around with them. But here you are, ready to roll over and leap through their hoops like a show dog."

"What the hell do you want me to do, Sam?" he hissed. "They _pulled me out of **hell**_. To apparently help stop the freakin' apocalypse. How'm I just gonna say no to that? 'Thanks, but no thanks--I prefer the meathooks, because that was _so much_ fun the first month or so. And, hey, sorry about all life on Earth getting sucked into the Pit.' Are you even listening to yourself?"

Throughout Dean's diatribe, his voice had risen above the conversation's hushed tones and a few curious heads turned their way.

Samuel, however, ignored the sudden attention in favor of something else. "Meathooks? . . . I thought you didn't remember anything about Hell."

Dean deflated suddenly, exasperation replacing ire in his tone. "I don't. I was trying to make a point, Sam."

Samuel quirked a skeptical eyebrow. "A point? A point with meathooks? Is that what it was like? Did they . . . Were you--?"

The shorter man interrupted before his brother could finished the stammered question. "How the hell should I know? I don't remember, remember?"

A chill went through Castiel as Samuel's gaze suddenly became hooded. "That isn't what Uriel said."

Dean froze.

Castiel's eyes narrowed but Dean abruptly rose and tossed money onto the table before the angel could respond.

"_Whatever_," the human bit out with tangible anger. "Screw this. I'm not hungry anymore anyway."

The motion brought him between Castiel and Samuel, breaking his line of sight and shielding the taller hunter from Castiel's eyes with a leather-clad back as he jerked on his jacket.

Samuel's head tilted to look up at his brother, expression closed as their eyes met. "I have to use the bathroom."

For a moment, Dean held his gaze in challenge, but then he made a noise of disgust at whatever he read in the other man's eyes and stomped out of the diner.

"Don't take too long, princess" he snapped as the door closed behind him with a jangle.

Samuel watched his brother's retreat, ignoring the curious looks of the other patrons and took a measured sip of his Coke and then reached into his pocket to toss a few bills on the table. Castiel watched the human's apparent calm curiously until the other people in the diner turned back to their own concerns and went back to ignoring the hunter. The human pushed back his glass and slid out of the booth when the scrutiny faded.

And then Samuel turned and looked straight at him.

Castiel blinked.

The boy's gaze didn't waver one iota and his expression remained calm and unruffled. The angel cocked his head to the side as a realization struck: Samuel could _see_ him. Not his true form--not the light of His Glory--but he could see Castiel sitting there and watching them. And he _knew_ him--knew him as the Christ had known Judas in the garden of Gethsemane.

There was no light in his gaze.

Their eyes met and Castiel took a measure of the younger hunter not as Samuel Winchester, the smiling, bashful brother and comrade to His Chosen, but rather as the Boy King. As the abomination he might become.

As the Adversary.

Samuel did not flinch.

Castiel watched him as he approached his table, expression calm and neutral. The challenge and frustration in the human's energy--in that swirling blackness within him--were obvious, but the angel felt no real concern. He was a warrior, after all. He did not fear fighting for what was his--he had been doing it for what seemed like his entire existence.

And Samuel Winchester was not a threat to him--not physically, at least. Not yet.

The two men met one another's gaze, each measuring and weighing the other. Up close, the angel was again struck by how different the other hunter was from Dean. It made it somewhat easier to remember who he was--_what_ he was.

Samuel spoke first, looking slightly unnerved by the angel's unwavering stare. "You're following us?" He paused and cleared his throat, canting his head towards the window where the Impala was parked. "Following him?"

He nodded, maintaining eye contact. "I am." There was no point in deception--not when he'd been caught in the act.

A muscle in Sam's jaw twitched as he clenched his teeth--(_like Dean_)--and Castiel felt his eyes narrow slightly before he could stop himself. He frowned slightly. He didn't want to think of the other Winchester when he was presented with this light-less Boy King.

A heartbeat of silence passed as they frowned at one another and each seemed to find the other  
lacking.

"You can't take him from me," the human stated at last in a firm, uncompromising voice. "Not you, and not Uriel. He's mine."

Castiel smiled serenely and nodded slightly in concession. "For now," he replied quietly and with just as much conviction. _But only for now._

The addendum went unsaid, but Samuel heard it clearly enough. His hazel eyes narrowed and the air around him seemed to lurch, thickening with barely restrained power. _Dark_ power. The lights flickered above them and time seemed to slow.

Castiel's nose wrinkled involuntary for a fraction of a moment, the vessel reacting viscerally to the perversion emanating from the human before him. His shoulders itched, wings longing to break free and become part of his visible frame, and the angel felt his own power rise to answer the Boy King's challenge. It was a challenge of power. A challenge of ownership. And Castiel could feel his human eyes fade for a moment as Divinity shown forth.

The Darkness vanished so abruptly that Castiel blinked, hiding the glimmer of his own Light that had been shining through. Samuel drew a sudden, shuttering breath and for a flash of a moment, the angel could clearly see fear in the boy's features. But it was not fear of Castiel.

It was fear of himself.

In that instant, the boy looked like the shy young man who'd shaken his hand scant days ago--heartrendingly young and painfully lost. Far from the Light.

_Oh God, Dean . . ._

The thought was projected and intrusive and entirely unintentional on the boy's part, but it struck Castiel hard, momentarily dragging the angel down in a heady and impossible to scrutinize mixture of needfeargrieflovefailuresorrowlustguiltragelosswantsorrysorrysosorryIcan't--

The angel shook his head slightly to shake off the tentative, one-way connection.

_**Ours**_, he asserted firmly in the boy's mind, with all the virtue and righteousness of one of the Host.

_Mine_, he thought more quietly to himself, the memory of Dean Winchester's battered and wounded soul held tightly in his grasp still bright and vivid.

The force of the thought seemed to flatten the child's panicked remorse, and his expression hardened again, shadows once more returning. He took a step back, but if the retreat was from Castiel or from his own momentary loss of control, the angel couldn't tell.

Samuel opened his mouth to voice another protest, but Castiel interrupted him. Pity colored his voice as he spoke, but there was also no room for argument. "You could ruin him if you pursue this path. Break him in ways you cannot begin to understand." His eyes hardened as he gazed at the boy, millennia of battles visible in their too-human surface. "You could ruin yourself."

Samuel stared, aggression and helplessness mixed in a poignantly human portrait. He and his brother looked painfully alike like that, bruised and bleeding souls both. Castiel could pity him for that resemblance . . . and maybe love him a little too.

". . . I could," the hunter whispered in a wounded tone, with all the conviction and obstinacy of a mortal. "Or I could save us both. I could save us all."

"You could," the angle conceded sadly. "But you are still only mortal, Sam. You won't."

A smile twitched over the boy's lips then--his brother's sneer, familiar and cruel. "Oh ye of little faith . . ."

The loud blow of a horn cut through the diner, piercing the air of confrontation between the two men and startling them both more than they'd care to admit. Around them, the diner--previously forgotten and unimportant--seemed to snap back into focus, patrons bustling about with complete ignorance of the battle that had been unfolding in their midst.

Castiel's eyes slid away from the boy to the hubbub of the diner. _Humans_, he thought, _so willing to ignore the predators before them._ He looked back to the hunter. _So frightened of Grace that they're damning themselves one breath at a time._

Samuel turned as though to leave and then paused, looking back over his shoulder. "He doesn't believe in God yet, you know," he tossed back. "But he believes in you." It was an offering, a warning, and an apology all rolled into one. His lips quirked up into a smile that might have been mischievous if Castiel could not see the darkness slithering through his soul. "But he'll always love me more. More than God. And more than you."

He turned the rest of the way and walked out of the diner without awaiting the angel's response.

Castiel stared after him, unable to identify the weight in his chest and the pressure squeezing at his human heart. The vessel knew the feeling instinctively, but it was novel to Castiel; angels were not overly familiar with affection like this. Or with heartbreak. The Lord didn't break hearts, after all.

He settled back in his seat and swallowed hard, watching through the window as Samuel climbed into his brother's car with an easy grace born of familiarity.

He could hear the Child's mocking voice in his memory and for some reason, it made the hurt in his chest intensify. _"So what? God is my copilot now?"_

The vehicle's headlights flared to life, momentarily blinding him, and then the car wheeled back, recoiling like a shot before peeling out onto the highway. The taillights danced like the eyes of a crossroads demon before they vanished into the darkness.

Emma materialized at his side, standing a bit away as though she was frightened of him. She had a right to be. Humans seemed to desperately desire salvation, but only when it was packaged palatably. They had very little love for true Glory. At least Dean had had the consistency to reject salvation wholesale when it had not come in the form he'd wanted. Not that it had done him any good in the end.

"Anything else, sir?" Her voice trembled a bit and her hands were were clutching her pad and pen desperately to steady themselves.

Castiel turned his human eyes to her, but stayed clear of her soul this time. "Another cup of coffee, please. And a slice of pie."

The pen scribbled furiously across the pad. "What kind?"

"Whatever the gentleman at that table was having." He pointed towards Dean's empty seat and the two slices of untouched pie still sitting on the table.

Emma dutifully scribbled something else down and bustled away, moving as quickly as she could without outright fleeing.

Castiel watched her go wearily.

There were those in the Host who held reservations about this plan--who wondered if humanity could be saved. If they were _worth_ saving. When Castiel had descended into the Pit to raise their champion, he had had no doubt. He had been sure and righteous in his purpose. Now, however, steeped in human flesh and privy to human vice and weaknesses, and face to face with Samuel Winchester . . . He didn't know any more.

He was . . . uncertain . . . for the first time in memory.

All he knew was that this was unfolding according to His Will, but--seeing the fear in the Child's eyes as he voiced the Host's intent in the dark (_"Stop him. Or we will."_)--that was not the comfort it should have been. Not when it might ruin the Child and all these other mortals as surely as the Boy King's lingering darkness might. . . . Not even when they might all--mortals and demons and angels alike--deserve such a fate.

Castiel sighed heavily and stared into his empty mug. He knew the Light, the Way, and the Truth, but he also knew the bitter clutch in his chest at Samuel's parting words and Dean's angry, accusatory skepticism. And increasingly, he was coming to know the root of both sentiments.

Even in Hell, Heaven had not felt quite this far away.

Emma reappeared suddenly, her sneakers now quiet on the sticky floor. A saucer was in one hand and a pot of coffee was in her other while Anne's grief shone in her eyes.

Two children. Their names had been Rachel and Arthur. They had liked to watch Blue's Clues and eat Spaghetti-O's. She wondered if they were still alive.

The angel turned away and looked back at the window as she set the plate before him.

_'...Their blood shall be upon them.'_

Castiel took a final sip of stone-cold coffee before handing the slightly cracked mug to the woman waiting at his side. Though long gone, he continued staring after the Impala's red taillights and his distant charge. Grace stirred within him, moved by something less divine.

_DeanOursMineChild._

Anne's hands shook as Emma topped him off.

**o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o**


	3. A Vast Image Out of Spiritus Mundi

**A Vast Image Out of Spiritus Mundi**  
By: Vain  
10/17 - 12/17/2008

**o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o**

**Standard Disclaimer:** I own nothing except the plot. Supernatural and all the elements therein are the intellectual property / registered trademarks of Eric Kripke and the CW. This is entirely a work of fiction; no profit is being made. All biblical quotations are taken from the King James Bible and/or the Apocrypha.

**Chapter Summary:** The game has been rigged and the deck stacked against him from the start, but Sam is going to bring down the entire fucking casino. And no one--be they trickster, angel, demon, or God Himself--is going to stop him from protecting Dean this time.

**Pairings:** Sam/Dean, (one-sided?) Sam/Ruby, & implied (one-sided?) Castiel/Dean

**Warnings:** abuse of biblical and religious references, blasphemy, slash of the slashy variety, wincest, implied het, language, all sorts of Season 4 S.P.O.I.L.E.R.S., and a hole in the bottom of the sea.

**Rated: R**

**Length:** about a bit over 8,000 words; complete.

**Notes:** This fic is the third in my Strange Angels 'Verse and follows "Intolerance of Ambiguity;" it takes place after episode 4.07: "It's the Great Pumpkin, Sam Winchester." PotentiallyEvil!Sammy Possessive!Sammy = love. The title was taken from W.B. Yeats's "The Second Coming."

Beta-ed by the lovely **Jekka**, who keeps me honest. All remaining errors are my own.

Originally posted at my LiveJournal.

Plagiarizers will be puppy chow, but reviews rock my salt.

Enjoy!

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_And God's anger was kindled because he went:  
and the angel of the Lord stood in the way for an adversary against him._  
**Numbers 22:22**

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_H_is fingers danced over the shadows pooled around her hips, gliding over the familiar softness of skin that wasn't really hers, but was still somehow all _Ruby_. He had done this before with different hips. Broader, sharper hips. Smaller, narrower hips. Firm, scarred skin, pulled taut over lean, steely muscle that was all _Dean_. And petal-soft, pale skin that seemed to go on and on and on that was all _Jess_.

"You're thinking of him, aren't you?"

There was no recrimination in her voice and Sam loved her a little bit for that.

"No," he replied after a moment. His voice was small and quiet in the darkness of the hotel room.

Outside of bed, with the lights on, they were give and take, push and pull, quid pro quo, and cautious, tentative concern. In the light there was guilt and recriminations. In the dark, though, between the sheets, they were only soft voices and desperate, achingly needy touches. And the ghosts, of course: the splay of Jess's golden hair across the pillow. Ruby's was nothing like it. And Dean arms, wrapping tight around him--two bands of steel keeping him grounded, keeping him safe and sane. Ruby's arms were bigger than Jess's, but they weren't Dean's. They weren't even close.

Jess had understood him and loved him. Dean had known him and loved him.

Ruby neither understood him, nor truly knew him, but she did seem to love him a little bit. Enough. And Jess and Dean were dead, if not completely gone.

Except Dean wasn't dead. Not anymore.

Dean was alive. Alive, and sleeping alone in a motel room ten miles away. And Sam? Sam was--

"Stop." Her voice cut through the stillness, firm and uncompromising.

Ruby rolled over on her side to face him more completely, one of her not-Dean-arms wrapping around his waist while the other came up to prop up her head. Her long, dark not-Jess-hair tumbled around her face, creating strange shadows. He could almost imagine that it was the shadows that made her eyes look black like that. Almost.

She had changed since Hell, his Ruby. Since the night that hellhounds ripped Dean apart in front of his eyes and Lillith pressed her stolen mouth against his, cruel and childish in her hunger, Ruby had been different. Her sharp edges had softened. Her humanity rode a little higher and her rage (and there was _so much rage_) had slid a little lower within her. She was different from the angry, sassy girl (demon) who'd murdered Pride the first night they met. And it had never been more obvious than it was now, with Dean back.

He smiled at her apologetically. "Sorry, I just--"

"Do I feel like him?" There was nothing but genuine curiosity her voice. "Inside?"

Sam turned away, rolled onto his back and looked at the ceiling. If it was anyone else, he wouldn't have believed the lack of criticism in her tone. Hell, a year ago, a question like that would have had him blushing crimson and never mind the situation that had prompted it. But he knew why she asked him and he understood her need to know. It wasn't the first time he'd called out his brother's name in bed with her, but it was the first time in a long while (their first night in that cabin, drunk, hurting, and so, so needy . . .) that he had been so . . . _desperate_ about it.

"No," he answered truthfully, still staring at the stains on the plaster ceiling. A lifetime ago, he might have explained the biology of it to her just to be a smartass, but now he just left it at that. "You're nothing like him in bed."

Just like life with Ruby was quid pro quo out of bed and quiet, adoring sacrifices in bed, life with Dean was the exact opposite. There was a tit for tat--even a measure of one-upmanship--when it came to sex with his brother, and stoic, uncomplaining martyrdom in the light of day. He'd always wondered if that was how Dean made amends in his mind for "soiling" Sam. But then again, Dean had always been like that--even before they were "they" in the romantic sense. Maybe it was just Dean's nature.

Ruby continued to watch him with unjudging black eyes. "He knows about us now though, right?"

He remembered her offer to back off that first night in the diner after Dean came back. _"I mean, I'm not exactly in your brother's fanclub, but he **is** your brother, and I'm not going to come between you."_ That was what her lips had said, even while her eyes begged him not to send her away.

Sam shrugged. "He suspects." _He won't touch me anymore._ "It's hard to hide things from Dean when he really wants to know something."

Though that seemed to have diminished a bit since Hell. Ruby wasn't the only one who had come back from the Pit different, even if he couldn't quite put his finger on just _how_ Dean had changed. Dean was still Dean; he just seemed a little less . . . Sam-oriented, if that made any sense. Even after Stanford, he and Dean had always been so in tune that he sometimes had trouble remembering where Sam ended and where Dean began. These days, though, something seemed to be off.

It also didn't help that his argument with Dean in the diner and his confrontation with the self-proclaimed 'Angel of the Lord' had weighed heavily on him over the past few weeks. Dean seemed blissfully oblivious to it all, though it was hard to tell with his brother these days. Even before he'd died that last, terrible time, he'd always played things close to the vest. Now, though . . . there were some days when Sam looked into his brother's eyes and saw nothing but silence.

It frightened him.

_"Faith, man. ... It was kinda personal."_

_"Personal? You're getting 'personal' with an angel now, Dean? Was it personal for you, or personal for him?"_

_"Don't be like that! I _can_ have conversations with people who aren't you, you know. It's not like you don't do the same thing."_

Dean was right, of course. It wasn't entirely Dean's fault that there was this distance between them, and it wasn't really his _angel's_, either. Part of the fault was Sam's. And the reason for it was curled beside him, watching him with soulless black eyes. He'd gotten used to the taste of hypocrisy these past few months. But he _still_ hadn't gotten used to Dean calling him out on it.

Ruby tapped his forehead with her forefinger suddenly, grounding him in the present. "Earth to Sammy? You still with me here?"

He blinked, banishing the memories, and caught her smaller hand within his own. He brushed his lips over her fingertips. "You know I hate it when you call me that."

"You're brooding," she chided, ignoring him.

"Thinking," he corrected without heat.

A soft smile teased her lips as the demoness leaned over towards him. "_Brooding_. When there's a perfectly good naked woman lying next to you. Way to make a girl feel wanted."

The words were said in jest, but there was a serious undertone there--a plea for reassurance that she wouldn't be cast aside again, that this hadn't all been in vain now that Dean was back--and Sam turned slightly and soothed the fear as best he could with a kiss. He couldn't make Ruby any promises, even if he should. Maybe especially because he should. He owed Ruby more than broken promises and comforting lies that they could both see through. It wasn't a secret that Dean would have to come first for him--now and always--and, even though he cared for her, this was little more than a warm body and a willing ear for him.

He may still have need of her, but when all was said and done, Ruby was ultimately replaceable. And Sam was insightful enough to know that doing this made him the worst kind of bastard where both Dean _and_ Ruby were involved.

_I'm sorry_, the kiss said. _I'm not casting you aside. Not again. Not this time. I need you. I'm so sorry._

She leaned into the soft and contrite press of his lips with quiet desperation, her small hands gripping his arms with inhuman strength as her tiny frame folded against his body. His arms came around her familiar hips (broader than Jess's, but narrower than Dean's), and he rolled them over, sheltering her beneath him.

_So sorry_, his kisses whispered. Their teeth clashed lightly and she nipped him hard, causing a small wash of copper to stain the kiss. The blood seemed only fitting. She licked it from the shallow cut on his lower lip when he pulled back to look down at her.

_Sorrysorrysorry._

Her hands slid up his back and her eyes were black and calm. _I know. It's okay._

Sam lightly ran the back of his hand over her smooth cheek, marveling for a moment at the strong line of her jaw and the lie of the pulse he could see fluttering at his throat. She could take a lot of punishment, his Ruby. He wondered if the same could have been said of the girl whose body she currently occupied. He wondered how she'd died.

He wondered if anyone missed her.

Instead of asking though, he abruptly rolled off of her and swung himself around to sit at the edge of the bed, his back to the brunette. There were already enough ghosts in his life without borrowing those belonging to strangers.

Behind him, Ruby made a sound that could have been a sigh and he stared at the streetlight streaming through the thin motel curtains. It was almost 3 am--close to the true witching hour. He wondered if Dean was dreaming of Hell now. He wondered if the liquor had worn off yet, and if, in its absence, the dreams Dean swore he didn't have had come. About now he would be tossing and turning and making those pathetic little whimpering pleas he always denied in the morning. He wondered if there was an angel there, watching over his brother's restless sleep.

The thought made him want to grind his teeth.

Sam turned slightly to face the woman sprawled behind her. The provocative spread of her limbs was not lost on him, but he couldn't get Castiel's calm, unwavering gaze out of his head. The confident tilt of his head--as though he'd already won the battle. And maybe he had; he'd done what Sam couldn't after all. He'd saved Dean. He'd put that stupid shine of wonderment mixed with hope and confusion in Dean's eyes whenever he spoke of the angel. It was kind of a mood-killer.

Ruby smiled at him, coy and welcoming.

Sam turned away to stare out the window again. "What do you know about angels? About Castiel?"

If the abrupt question startled her, the demon didn't indicate it. Instead she sighed again quietly and stretched on the mattress, cat-like. She made a soft humming noise as she sat up behind him and pulled her knees up close to her chest, curling into a small ball. " . . . He's a soldier in Micheal's legion--trusted, but not particularly special or powerful. The angel of Thursday and a patron of sacrifices and martyrs . . . though most angels have a soft spot for that kind of thing."

Sam snorted at that, (_'Soft spot,' my ass..._), but she pressed on, her voice faintly muffled as she rested her chin on her knees. "He's young . . . for an angel. One of the last batch, I guess. But they say that when The Third fell, he was able to look Lucifer in the face and refuse him. Most of the others were frightened of Lucifer's Glory. And when angels were walking around in meatsuits back in the day, he stayed away in Heaven--too young to go down I guess, but he was there for the Harrowing of Hell, when the gateways between Hell and Earth were last sealed."

"He's never been on Earth before then?"

". . . Maybe once--back when it was still wild and angels did that sort of thing. I don't know." He could feel her eyes on him. "Angels . . . are not well-spoken of in Hell, Sam. It's not like I can just pick up the guy's biography at the demon Barnes & Noble. Ever since Dean got pulled out, everyone in Hell has been going crazy. Something's happening and you guys and the Seals are only one part of it."

He looked down at his hands. "What do you mean?"

". . . Don't play dumb, Sammy." For all the chastisement in her words, her voice sounded flat and deflated. "It doesn't suit you."

"Don't call me that," he warned her again mildly.

Ruby gave a little snorting laugh and shifted her weight slightly. The ancient-sounding bedsprings creaked beneath her. "Your brother's angel? He wasn't exactly gentle when he pulled Dean out of Hell. Angels don't _belong_ in Hell, but damned souls do. The combination of trying to keep Dean in and force the Winged Wonder out . . . The space in between tore a bit--sprung a leak."

Sam turned, twisting on the bed so that he could see her again. "What?"

"Relax," Ruby murmured with a humorless grin. "Hell sealed itself up again. But some demons still got out, Sam. Bad ones. Even without Lilith to contend with, you guys would have your hands pretty full."

He frowned at her, his eyes dark. "You make it sound like Hell is alive or something."

The grin remained fixed and cold--like a death's head. "It is."

Sam turned away, uncomfortable with the new questions that provoked. He fixed his eyes on the curtains again. They were drab and uninteresting--piss yellow in the faded streetlight. " . . . And Uriel? What do you know about him?"

"The angel who watches over thunder and terror."

He turned his head questioningly, looking at her out of the corner of his eye.

Ruby shifted behind him and her voice came out muffled as she put her head down to her knees. "I know that he scares the holy hell out of everyone, Sam. Uriel's a bigwig in the Host." The word 'Host' was spat out like something unpleasant. Sam looked back to the window as she continued, "They gave him a measure of dominion over Hell and he exercised his authority with a vengeance. He brought damnation down on the Fallen who loved humans and on their offspring, the Nephilim. Basically, if angels are kicking demon ass, he's in the thick of it." There was a tentative touch on his back, but it vanished before he could fully register it. "Stay away from him, Sam. He's dangerous. He hates our kind."

The light of a passing car hit the window, momentarily blinding the hunter. He closed his eyes a moment too late to avoid the red spots from light-seared retinas from invading his vision.

_Our kind._ Like he was like Ruby--a demon.

Maybe he was.

Silence stretched out between them, long and strangely comfortable. He probably should have been more upset by Ruby's words, but it was difficult to marshal an adequate defense, even if it was only in him mind. He was too tired these days. Too worn thin.

Too raw.

Another car passed by and in the stillness of the room, he could her the soft ticking of the clock on the wall. Three o'clock. Last call.

"What is it like--being in Hell?" That wasn't the question he'd meant to ask at all.

Behind him, Ruby stiffened and the inquiry hung in the air between them, suspended like an angry spirit.

He wouldn't take it back, though. He'd been avoiding the question for months while Dean was gone and now it suddenly seemed to burn through him. He turned slightly to face her and hazel eyes met black eyes expectantly.

Ruby turned away, full lips twisting into a bitter line. "Hell is Hell," she responded dully. "It's _pain_, Sam--pain like you can't imagine. There aren't words for it. There isn't anything that I could ever tell you to make you understand what it's like. There's no mercy. No respite. No . . . no anything. There's nothing but pain and hurt and degradation and rage and--and . . . _loss_." She turned back to him. Her expression was schooled in a familiar mask of veiled contempt, but her eyes--now brown again--shimmered with something intense. "That's the worst of it. You lose yourself. You forget your name, the people you loved, who you were, why you're there . . . You forget _everything_. Everything but hurting and being hurt. You forget everything but the rage--the need to lash out and make someone else feel all that pain."

Sam looked away, unable to meet her suddenly human eyes. He liked the demon-depths better. He couldn't see himself in them. "Is that what it's like for everyone?" His voice sounded rough in the dark, as though he'd been screaming.

Ruby was quiet for a minute, abruptly human eyes boring holes in the space between his shoulder blades. "Mostly," she murmured after a moment. She turned away, pulling herself tighter into her ball. "Some people . . . Some people are special. Dean was special."

Sam flinched.

Ruby continued without looking at him, her voice soft as she talked to the opposite wall. "He was sent to be broken by the best of the best. Hell's elite. Everyone knew he was there. It was like a carnival or something for the demons of higher status: 'Step right up and dunk the chump.' Only . . . you know . . . with more screaming. I never saw him, though. Like I said, Dean was special--a _project_. I was . . . despised." He didn't have to look at her to know she was smiling bitterly; he could hear it in her voice. "I picked the wrong side. Lilith made a special hell for me."

Sam was silent for a moment, his pulse pounding in his ears. He may not have known what Hell looked like--what it felt and smelled and tasted like--but his imagination happily filled in the details. Dean and Ruby, alone and writhing in fire and blood.

Needing him.

_"He was sent to be broken . . . Lilith made a special hell for me."_

"It's your pride they take first," she whispered harshly. "The word 'rape' doesn't even begin to cover it. Your soul is your body and they take it. They violate you in the worst ways you can think of--worse than you can ever dream. Humans have nothing on demons when it comes to torture--especially when you can't die and you can't pass out and you can't stop bleeding and your throat never wears out from screaming. They take your heart. They take the ones you love--the ones you need. Husbands, wives, fathers, mothers . . . It's their mouths on you--their hands breaking you. Your best friends and your worse enemies. Every horror you've never imagined is wearing their faces and they're all on you--_in_ you--telling you everything you never wanted to hear. They turn you inside out emotionally and psychologically. And then physically. Stretching and ripping and pulling and twisting apart under hands and knives and hooks. The pain never gets old. Never stops. Even when you heal, you can _feel_ your body regrowing itself cell by agonizing cell. Except there aren't any cells--just your soul. And as soon as it scrapes itself back together, it starts all over again. And over and over--"

"Stop."

Ruby fell silent and it took Sam a moment to realize his hands were trembling and aching. He forced open fists he hadn't even known he was making and he could see angry crescents pressed into his palms in the darkness--ridges where his nails had pressed into his flesh.

"Just . . . _Stop_." His chest was heaving and his voice was thin and hoarse.

There was a quiet rustling behind him and a moment later he felt the press of a small, cool hand against the small of his back. "Sam . . . I'm sorry."

Somehow the thought of Ruby apologizing for his pain--_Ruby_, who had gone to a 'special hell' because he had been _such_ a stubborn asshole about his powers, _apologizing_ . . .

_"Do you even know how far off the reservation you've gone? How far from normal? From **human**?"_

Sam dropped his head to his chest with a shudder and for a terrible moment, it seemed like the hand on his back was the only thing holding him to the earth. Sadly, that probably wasn't too far from the truth these days.

_Jesus Christ . . ._

"I need to go," he muttered without moving. The words sounded forced, even to his own ears.

_"You don't need me. You and Ruby go fight demons."_

Those arms--_Not Jess. Not Dean._--wrapped around his shoulders from behind, holding him tight. Holding _onto_ him tight. She rested her head between his shoulders and her breath was warm against his skin.

_"And it's nice in this body, Sam . . . Soft and warm. . ."_

"I shouldn't have told you that," she whispered, the soft regret in her actual voice banishing the lust-filled murmur of his memory. Her lips and eyelashes fluttering against his back like stray butterflies.

Sam shook his head. "I asked." He lifted his hands and pressed them lightly against the demon's. "I wanted to know." A beat of silence. And then: "He says he doesn't remember Hell."

Ruby stilled for a moment and her embrace tightened uncomfortably, constricting his breathing. " . . . He's lying. There are some things you can't forget. Not even Heaven could erase that."

But Sam couldn't help but wonder just how far his brother's angelic stalker would go to keep Dean in line. Other than drinking like fish, the older seemed surprisingly hale after a four-month stint in the Pit. And, Castiel's claims that he wasn't going to perch on Dean's shoulder notwithstanding, the angel's tendency to turn up at strange times (conveniently when Sam wasn't around and Dean was sleeping or otherwise vulnerable), was suspicious to say the least. Having met Castiel twice now, and with Uriel's threats still burning in his mind, Sam was hard pressed to trust the angels or take what they said on faith. He wouldn't put it past them to have messed with Dean's already admittedly messed up head--maybe erase a memory here or there.

They'd been prepared to smite an entire town to get what they wanted. And Dean already wore Castiel's brand (something that bothered Sam to no end). They said that they were on the good guys' side, but what was one man in the grand scheme of things? Dean may have meant everything to Sam, but the angels, he was probably just another tool, no matter how badly Sam wanted to believe the contrary.

The real kick in the teeth, though, was that he _wanted_ to have faith in them. For his own sake. For Dean's. Hell, for _everyone_. If humanity had ever need of divine intervention, now seemed to be the time. He wanted to trust them and reaffirm his faith in a merciful God. But how the hell was he supposed to do that when God's own messengers smilingly prepared to wipe out 1300 relatively innocent lives to preserve a single seal?

Dean had defended them, of course--just like he'd always defended Dad. And it had grated on Sam to hear his brother actually _defend_ Castiel--as though Dean owed him something (although, maybe he did). He'd claimed that it was all a part of whatever bass-ackward test they were subjecting him to. But Sam had no doubt that Uriel would have happily wiped out that entire town and Castiel would have let him without batting an eyelash. Angels were just as inhuman and inhumane as demons, it seemed, but at least with demons, they knew where they stood.

Behind him, Ruby released her grip and moved to stand, rolling off of the other side of the bed. Sam turned to watch her, ignoring the almost absently lustful tightening of his stomach as she searched for her clothing in the dim light.

_Well_, he amended silently, _we know where we stand with **most** demons_.

Her skin seemed to glow softly.

_Why are you doing this?_ he almost blurted out in the darkness. But then Ruby turned, feeling his eyes on her, and looked at him questioningly. He turned away, unable to meet her gaze.

Instead he asked, "When will I see you again?" It came out more as a demand than a question.

Ruby paused in the middle of inspecting the damage to the red panties she'd been wearing earlier. Sam had not been gentle in removing them. She watched him thoughtfully for a moment, unashamed of her nudity, and then she shrugged. "When do you want to see me again?"

The hunter looked away, staring back at the curtain as though they might hold the answer. ". . . I think we might need some time. Dean and I. Things are--"

"Will you tell him?" she interrupted. Her voice was crisp and business-like, as though indifferent to his answer.

He remembered how her face had twisted in pleasure beneath him a mere hour ago, her eyes black in the throes of passion and locked onto him as though he held the secret to everything she'd ever wanted. He wondered how much of her tone now was feigned. He wondered how thoroughly he was being played--_if_ he was being played. Or maybe he was the bad guy in this and the pleas and permission she whispered below and around him in the dark were the real story.

He wondered if Dean would ever touch him again.

Sam closed his eyes and dropped his head. "He'll ask eventually."

To be honest, Sam wasn't sure why he hadn't asked yet. Sometimes he could feel his brother's eyes on him--so carefully blank and unfamiliar after four months in the ground--and he could feel that questions rolling through the older man's mind. He could feel the accusations: _How did you manage without me? How could you?_

. . . Though, maybe that last bit was only in Sam's head. Maybe he only thought Dean was asking the question because Sam was desperate to know the answers himself. How _had_ he managed without Dean? And why the hell couldn't he seem to mesh with his brother again?

It was like the hole Dean's death had left in him--that place where Dean was supposed to be--had scabbed over and started to heal and, now that he was back, Dean didn't fit there any more. Like that bond that they'd shared was too damaged--maybe irreparably. And Sam didn't know who to blame for it. So where did that leave him--leave them, if there was even still a "them" any more?

Ruby made a noncommittal noise behind him. Sam scowled at the carpet. _I don't owe you anything,_ he wanted to say to her. _I didn't ask for your help. You volunteered for this. I haven't made any promises to you._

Except he _did_ owe her something--he owed her a hell of a lot, in fact. And, while he hadn't made her any promises, God knows he'd _wanted_ to. Still wanted to sometimes. Because things with Ruby were easier than things with Dean. And Ruby was _his_ and Dean was . . . Was something else now. Something that Sam didn't recognize anymore was terrified to understand.

Somehow, having Dean here and alive, and knowing that Dean wasn't _his_ anymore was worse than losing Dean to the hounds. Worse than loosing him to the Rawhead, or to the car accident, or to the 121 horrible Tuesdays the Trickster had forced him to live through before that last terrible Wednesday.

Sam had had contingencies for Dean dying on him. They hadn't worked, but he'd _tried_, damnit. But he didn't have contingencies for Dean _leaving_ him; that had never been in the cards. And he was so fucking sick of _losing_ everything: Mom, Dad, Jess, his normal life at Stanford, the endless sacrifices of his childhood to their father's revenge. Everything he'd loved--_every. single. thing._--had been taken from him. Hell, even his humanity had been put on the chopping block. His entire fate seemed to be controlled by a single night that happened when he was six months old and now Hell was out for his blood because he wouldn't take their crown and Heaven had no room for 'his kind,' only for his transient utility in their war.

And Sam was just sick of it all.

They wouldn't get Dean again. They _wouldn't_. And Ruby? Well, whatever else she may be, Ruby was his too. He was through with compromises.

He looked up to find Ruby now clad in jeans and socks. The panties had apparently been declared a lost cause and were in the trash.

"I'll call you," he said suddenly, his voice surprisingly firm.

The demon turned back to him as she fixed her bra's clasps behind her back. "There's something going on. I heard rumbling about some sort of bounty being put out of a human. You want me to look into it? It sounds kind of major."

"Yeah." He stood and stretched, bones popping in protest. He was tired--entirely too tired--but he knew Dean would let him sleep in the car. He'd missed that freedom when his brother was gone. He'd missed a lot of things. "We're headed East for a bit. Come find me if you need anything."

"Even with Dean around?" It was a careful question--testing.

Sam rotated his wrist, working out a kink, and looked at her expressionlessly. "He'll deal. Just stop goading him." A smirk answered him and he scowled. "I mean it, Ruby."

The smirk didn't fade, but she mockingly snapped her bare heels together and saluted him, S.S.-style. "Sieg heil, mein Führer."

Sam jaw tightened, but she turned and bent to retrieve her boots and top before he could retort. "I'm headed out then." She stood, items in hand, and looked back at him with strangely earnest black eyes. "Be careful, Sam."

The hunter looked at her for a moment, but was unable to say anything. She looked painfully human like that--as fragile and female and perfect as Jess had ever been--even when her eyes told a different story. He turned and headed towards the bathroom. "You too."

There were no promises between them after all.

He closed the door behind him, cutting off her quiet sigh, and stepped in the shower to wash the scent of her off his skin.

**o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o**

Dean was awake when he got in. It was close to 4:00 in the morning and the older man was perched on the foot of his bed closest to the door, an infomercial for some sort of super-absorbent towel blasting on the grainy television set while he worked his way through a bottle of Jack that hadn't been there when Sam had left. He didn't look up when Sam entered, instead taking a swig of the now half-empty bottle. His favorite gun sat beside him on the bed and the taller hunter paused in the doorway for a moment, taking in the sight. He couldn't help but wonder if the gun was there for protection or for something else. Then he couldn't help but wonder if leaving Dean alone with liquor and an armament fit to take on the town's entire police force was the wisest course of action.

It was a stupid question to ask though. If Dean were going to off himself, he'd have done it already, right?

Red-rimmed green eyes turned to him after a moment and Sam wasn't so sure.

"Close the door. It's freaking cold out there."

At least his brother wasn't slurring his speech yet. Though, Dean's alcohol tolerance seemed to have shot through the roof since his return. Sam wondered if angels could heal cirrhosis of the liver in addition to rehymenating someone.

He carefully stepped over the salt line before turning around and shutting the door. "Did you sleep at all?"

Dean's eyes were fixed on the TV again as an overly-excited man expounded on the virtues of the ShamWow. The light cast by the bright picture seemed to highlight the tired lines on his face and the heavy, raccoon-like smudges of shadow around his eyes. "I sleep." Which wasn't really an answer at all. "Where have you been?"

Sam tossed his jacket on the rickety table by the window and shrugged. Avoided Dean's knowing gaze as he crossed the room. "Went for a walk." He threw himself face-first on the bed and his hair--still wet from the shower--seemed unusually chilled, as though chastising him for the lie.

Dean snorted skeptically, eyes burning into Sam's back like hot coals, but said nothing.

Sam tried to force his body to relax in the over starched bed sheets, but it seemed impossible. Every swallow Dean took out of the liquor bottle seemed magnified by a thousand in his ears. He shifted restlessly in bed.

"You want me to turn off the television?"

Sam turned slightly to look at him with hooded eyes. _I want you to stop drinking like a fucking fish. I want you to stop smoking like a chimney when you think I'm not looking. I want you to stop flirting with everyone in the world but me. I want you to stop self-destructing in front of my eyes. I want you to let me in._ His lips twitched upwards towards a mockery of a smile at his own hypocrisy. "No, Dean. I'm fine."

The older man paused in the middle of raising his bottle and turned towards him, cocking his head slightly to the side. The gesture was oddly canine, as though Dean were attempting to find out the source of the problem by scenting the air. They stared at one another, eyes locked in TV-lit room, secrets crowding the space between them. Even against the noise of the television, it seemed weirdly quiet in the room. Sam imagined that he could feel the ghosts of Ruby's touch on his skin. That he could hear Jess's soft sigh at his ear. That he could taste Dean, both fragile and forceful, against his lips. It made his breathing come a bit faster.

Dean raised the remote without looking away and turned off the television, plunging the room into darkness.

"Dean . . ."

"No, Sam."

Harsh and abrupt. Sam flinched as though the other man had taken a swing at him. He pursed his lips and sat up in bed.

"_Dean_."

The thump of glass on fiberboard as the liquor bottle was placed on the nightstand followed by creaking bedsprings. A defeated murmur: "I'm tired, Sam."

"You don't sleep," the younger hunter pointed out, eyes finally adjusted to the darkness enough to make out Dean's still formed sprawled atop the covers. He was still fully clothed, of course . . . like he expected he'd have to wake up and make a quick escape. Big surprise.

Dean turned his head to look at him and his already indistinct features vanished in a blur of shadows. "'M not doing this right now, Sammy," he grated out. His tone promised violence.

_I miss you_, Sam wanted to say. Instead he looked away and laid down in bed reluctantly. He wanted to reach across the small two foot gap between their beds, but those two feet may as well have been two hundred miles right now. Dean had never done well with people reaching out to him without solicitation. There were too many monsters--both human and supernatural--and nosy social workers in the their past for him to accept a hand up. And these days, Dean was more stubborn about it than ever.

Apparently only one person was allowed to reach down and pull him from perdition now. And that person wasn't Sam.

The realization tasted like bile on his tongue.

"Goodnight," he whispered softly, ignoring his stomach's roiling and the memory of Castiel's knowing blue eyes.

Dean didn't reply.

**o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o**

The gray light of dawn was filtering through the curtains when Sam awoke to the sound of screaming. Not subtle whimpers. Not murmured pleas. No. Full-blown screaming.

Dean. Twisted in his bedsheets like a contortionist. Twisted in a way that looked unnatural and painful and horrifyingly like something right out _The Exorcism of Emily Rose_. Wide open eyes unseeing, pupils blown and glassy, mouth stretched too wide in a frightening rictus--the only thing that didn't seem frozen. And he was screaming Sam's name.

"Saaaaaaam!"

"Jesus Christ!"

Sam had no memory of scrambling out of bed, but he surely must have because one moment he was jerked violently out of sleep and the next he was beside Dean's bed, hands hovering mere centimeters from his bother's twisted body, terrified to touch him. Terrified not to.

And Dean . . . Dean's voice was . . . _wrecked_. Broken in a way Sam couldn't even begin to wrap his mind around.

A spasm jerked Dean's body, snapping his spine back at an impossible angle, and it was something like a cross between a full-body charlie horse and a seizure.

"JesusJesusJesus--"

It had never been like this before. Dean had never, _ever_ been like this before.

Hell, _no one_ should look like this--nothing human, at least.

_ "Ask your brother what he remembers from Hell."_

Sam made a wrecked, keening noise, hands fluttering in the air above Dean like tethered birds, because he just didn't know what else to do.

The attack--or spasm, or _whatever_--ended as abruptly as it had begun. All the tension abruptly left Dean with a whimper and his body relaxed, collapsing onto the bed like soft wax, loose and pliant. His eyes closed, face twitching towards the now familiar expression of pain that always haunted it in sleep, and he lay still. His body was askew on the bed at a crazy angle, but he looked strangely peaceful, as though the last terrifying ten second of their lies had never happened.

For three long beats, neither man moved again. Then Sam was on him in flash, straddling his brother's thighs before he could think better of it and hauling the sleeping man up and awake his a violence that would have alarmed him if he'd been thinking of it. "Dean! _Dean!_"

Green eyes flashed open again, disoriented but blessedly conscious. The empty, blank look was gone, replaced by bewilderment and the start of anger, and Dean pushed weakly against his chest, arms shaking and clumsy.

"Seriously, dude--"

Whatever he was going to say was lost when Sam jerked him into a rough, stifling embrace, clinging to him tightly. Both their hearts were thundering in chests, weird staccato echoes of one another, and all Sam could do was hold tight and murmur agitated curses. "What the hell, man? What the hell?"

Dean struggled weakly, but his limbs didn't seem to be coordinating properly. The image of his twisted and frozen body was locked in Sam's mind's eye and he wondered how long Dean had been lying like that before Sam awoke. And how the hell long this had been going on.

"Dude!" More weak and ineffectual shoving. Dean's voice sounded raw. "What is going on with you?"

Sam clung tightly, ignoring the elbow in the ribs he got for his trouble. He could feel the older man's chest expanding against his with every breath--could feel his heart thundering like a herd of wild horses--and he couldn't let go for a moment. Not until the fear passed and he could think again.

"Why won't you let me help you?" he whispered, unable to keep the fear and frustration he felt out of his voice.

Dean stiffened and said nothing.

While Dean was gone, grief and rage and a _loss_ so deep that his mind shied back from the memory had threatened to drown him. And those emotions hadn't eased that much with his brother's return. Even now, months later, he half expected to wake up and find that he was still back in Illinois and had just dreamed all this. He _needed_ this--_needed_ to be grounded here and now by the feel of Dean in his arms, alive and mostly whole, by the familiar scent of his brother beside him.

Sam knew that his grip had to be leaving bruises, but he couldn't let go. Not yet.

Dean shuddered in his arms after a few moments. "Can't help me, Sammy."

The words were said so quietly that Sam would have missed them if he hadn't been so close to the other man.

The younger man forced himself to relax his grip; it was harder than it should have been.

Dean was avoiding his eyes, staring out at the thin, desperate light of dawn trying to fight its way through the ratty, stained curtains. Every line in his body hummed with tension. Sam swallowed hard and withdrew, shifting so that he was seated next to the other hunter on the bed. It was all he could do not to reach out and shake him.

"I can't lose you again, Dean." His voice sounded flat and too loud in the still room.

Dean dragged his eyes away from the window and looked at Sam silently for a moment with an unreadable gaze. Then his lips quirked towards a hard, self-deprecating smirk and Sam could almost _see_ the walls sealing back up, brick by brick. "Not going anywhere, man."

He clenched his jaw, hating the deception and Dean's stupid, self-castigating need to hide everyfuckingthing from him, just like always. But things weren't like they were before. SamandDean weren't like they were before and they couldn't keep pretending. "You sure about that?"

The other man's eyes narrowed and a muscle in his jaw jumped--a red flag indicating very real anger. He looked away again. "Where did you say you went this morning again?"

It didn't sound like an accusation, but there was nothing else that it could have been. Sam's hands clenched into fists in his lap.

_I was with Ruby._ It would be such an easy thing to say. He could lay it all out, right here and now. He could call Dean's bullshit and just _say_ it . . . _I'll show you mine if you show me yours._ He could pull Dean down into the lingering darkness of those four booze-soaked months, rips the scabs off those wounds and just let the pus flow. . . . And he could also risk never seeing those walls fall again. Or worse, seeing them fall for someone _else_.

Sharing had never been Sam's forte.

_I'm selfish_, he almost wanted to say. It was really Dean's fault anyway for spoiling him rotten. What had he expected?

Instead, though, he opted for a different kind of truth--one that should have meant a lot more than it probably did. "I wasn't--" His tongue tripped over itself, uncertain of how to form the proper words. "I haven't used my powers since Samhain."

The other man's mouth twisted in a bitter expression, rejecting the answer without really saying anything at all.

"I _haven't_, Dean." He grabbed his brother's arm and pulled on him slightly, physically arresting the other man with a bruising grip. "You _know_ I haven't."

Something desperate must have shone in his face because Dean's expression softened and the coldness left his eyes.

"I know, Sammy." He gripped Sam's hand as though about to peel it away but stopped.

Sam felt a measure of tension leave him at the touch and stared at the battered-looking hunter for a moment. He'd never really noticed before, but there were tiny flecks of gold in Dean's eyes, like slivers of sunlight . . .

Their lips met before Sam was fully aware that he'd leaned forward and Dean's grip on his hand tightened. For a minute, it seemed as though the older man would not respond at all, but then he made a quiet little noise in the back of his throat and his lips parted to Sam's kiss. Sam sighed softly in response.

Before Hell but after Stanford and before Dad, their first kiss had been an awkward, drunken taboo. Sam had needed comfort and Dean . . . Dean had just needed Sam. Their relationship had moved in lurches and near misses, with every embrace and gasp a frantic affirmation that, _Yeah. Yeah. We're still here._ This kiss, though, was different. It was soft and needy and somehow heart achingly _sad_. It wasn't hot and desperate like Ruby's kisses. Nor was it gentle and playful like Jess's. And somehow (thank God), the ghost of Dean Before Hell faded and blended with this new and not-quite-familiar Post-Hell Dean as Sam's tongue lightly swept his brother's mouth and tasted bitterness and Jack Daniels.

This . . . This was just Dean needing comfort. And Sam needing Dean.

Dean's other hand came up and slipped around the back of Sam's neck with a faint clatter of teeth as he deepened the kiss and Sam rose his own hand in response and gripped Dean's shoulder, fingers falling over the angry ridges of that horrible brand, covering it. Engulfing it.

Outside in the distance, the tires of a passing car screeched on the road and Dean abruptly broke away, shaking his head as he moved. "I can't--" His voice was rough and it had nothing to do with the nightmare that had awakened them both. He twisted to escape, trying to push the younger man away. "Sam--"

The brunet pitched forward, cutting off the words that he didn't want to hear by wrapping his arms around the older man again. There was a brief struggle, of course, because Dean always struggled, but Sam didn't let go.

Just held on and breathed.

"Shut up, Dean."

After a brief moment, Dean's arms wrapped around him, loose and hesitant. They wouldn't speak of this again and they both knew it, but for now, Sam needed it. And Dean always gave Sam what he needed.

That was all that mattered, no matter what Castiel said or Uriel threatened. This . . . SamandDean . . . that was what mattered. They could deal with everything else later.

Because Dean came first, before both Heaven and Hell. And if Castiel and Uriel wanted to bar his way, then they had better bring their whole damned army with them because he _was not_ losing Dean again. Not again. That wasn't happening ever again and if he had to fly in the face of Heaven . . . if he had to defy the God who'd healed Dean's body but let his mind be broken into a thousand pieces . . . Well then, so be it.

He held on tightly, sheltered in his brother's embrace, and imagined he could feel the heat of both Heaven and Hell's ire and Castiel's cold, inhuman blue eyes all focused on them. It had nothing on Dean's warmth pressed against him. "Just . . . Just don't give up on me, man. Don't let me go."

"I won't Sammy." He still sounded painfully sure . . . reassuringly _Dean_, no matter who had branded his shoulder. "I got you."

And then: _I've got you._

He could hear the thought echoed in Dean's mind--a small leak in the flood walls surrounding his powers--firm and uncompromising and for a moment it was just SamandDean again. Them against the world. And Dean was his, no matter what. Brother, friend, protector, lover . . . No matter what else might come, Dean was _his_.

**o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o**


	4. I am Become as Sounding Brass

** I am Become as Sounding Brass**  
By: Vain  
10/27/2008 - 2/2/2009

**o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o**

**Standard Disclaimer:** I own nothing except the plot. Supernatural and all the elements therein are the intellectual property / registered trademarks of Eric Kripke and the CW. This is entirely a work of fiction; no profit is being made. All biblical quotations are taken from the _King James Bible_.

**Summary:** 'And we all Fall down.' With Heaven on one side and Hell on the other, all Dean wants is Sam and the open road--but that choice may very well be out of his hands.

**Pairings:** (one-sided?) Castiel/Dean, Sam/Dean, & references to Sam/Ruby and past Alistair/Dean

**Warnings: dubious consent**, abuse of biblical and religious references, blasphemy, slash of the slashy variety, wincest, implied het, language, all sorts of Season 4 S.P.O.I.L.E.R.S., and a hole in the bottom of the sea.

**Rated: _hard_ R**

**Length:** about 10,400 words; complete.

**Notes:** This fic is the fourth in my Strange Angels 'Verse and follows "A Vast Image Out of Spiritus Mundi;" it takes place after episode 4.13: "After School Special."  
Beta-ed by the ever lovely and inspirational **Jekka-chan**; all remaining errors are my own.  
For reference, the title was taken from 1 Corinthians 13:1 and the opening line is from Shakespeare's "Hamlet," Act 1, scene 5.

Originally posted on my LiveJournal.

Plagiarizers will be puppy chow, but reviews rock my salt.

Enjoy!

**o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o**

_Behold, I send an Angel before thee, to keep thee in the way,  
and to bring thee into the place which I have prepared.  
Beware of him, and obey his voice, provoke him not;  
for he will not pardon your transgressions: for my name is in him._  
**Exodus 23:20-21**

**o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o**

_"T_here are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, than are dreamt of in your philosophy."

Quarters clattered to the ground as Dean nearly jumped out of his skin.

He whirled with a scowl to face the angel suddenly standing at his side. "Jesus, Cas! You trying to kill me again?"

Castiel frowned, eyes going to where the human's left hand clutched his now-pounding heart and then to where his right hand had slid back towards the gun concealed in his waistband. Dean met his eyes for a moment, matching frown for frown, before his gaze flickered unnecessarily around the empty Laundromat as he eased his hand away from the gun again. Sam wasn't due back for hours--he'd gone off to 'look for a job,' which meant he'd be returning with damp hair and the smell of sulfur and perfume clinging to him--and the Laundromat's manager, a slovenly man whom Dean had only seen once when Sam had dropped him off, had vanished into the back room well over an hour ago. That meant that Dean was alone. With Castiel.

So not awesome.

_Figures he'd show up **now**_, the hunter thought irritably as he bent to retrieve his money. It had been almost two months since South Dakota. Two months since the angel Anna had regained her Grace and vanished screaming into the cold white light. Two months since Castiel and Uriel had vanished from the barn with nary a 'thank you for not letting Alistair choke me to death.' And now, true to form, here was Castiel again, all giant blue eyes and flat, enigmatic expressions, as though nothing had ever happened.

He glared at the other man and edged back a little. The denizens of Heaven apparently didn't understand the concept of personal space. Which kind of made sense, actually, since the same could be said for the denizens of Hell. He quashed that thought fast.

_No need to go there, Winchester. Not now. Not ever._ He had a front row seat to Hell's Greatest Hits every time he slept or made the mistake of looking too long in the mirror, searching eyes for misplaced traces of demon black--he didn't need that crap to consume him during the day too.

"You've got a lot of nerve showing up here, you know." Dean shoved the recovered coins into his pocket with more aggression than necessary. He was angry and spoiling for a fight. Sam had been weird ever since the gig at Roosevelt High--back to his secrets and silences and sex with Ruby sessions. And Dean was in no real shape to call him on it these days. "After what you two nearly did to Anna--"

"Anna was . . ."

Dean turned to grab the detergent from the top of the machine he'd been loading before Castiel's arrival, still frowning as the angel trailed off. He paused when he saw Castiel avoiding his eyes almost guiltily and pursed his lips. "Anna was what?"

"A mistake," Castiel finished after a moment. He raised his too-sincere eyes to Dean again and the hunter felt his skin crawl beneath that perceptive gaze. It was weird to have Castiel focus his whole attention on him. Most of the time the angel looked like he was half-tuning into something else--angel radio, maybe--but sometimes he would look at Dean, really _look_ at him, and it made all the hunter's hair want to stand on end. The only person he'd ever seen someone look at him that intently was Sam and Sam was . . . well, Sam was intense in his own right. Dean had gotten used to that by the time he was five. But having an angel of the Lord fix that much attention on him made something at the base of his spine freeze.

"You and Sam were not supposed to be there."

The human covered his discomfort by shrugging slightly and pouring a good quarter of a box of value brand detergent into the washer. "_That_ was the mistake? Sam and me getting in the way?" He glared at the other man. "You were going to kill that poor girl."

The intent look broke again as Castiel's eyes seemed to glaze over for a moment, listening to something only he could hear. "Anna was neither poor nor was she truly a girl. Falling as she did . . . Tearing out one's Grace . . . I do not think you quite understand what she did, Dean. It is not a simple amputation as she described it. It is a rejection of the Lord--of His Will and her place. Angels are not like humans. We are granted only one life. We do not have souls; we have Grace. And, unlike souls, Grace belongs not to us, but is a part of the Lord. _We_ are a part of the Lord--small extensions of His Will: His love, His wrath, His mercy, and everything in between. Anna spat in the face of God when she tore out her Grace; she caused a wound felt by the whole Host. Not even Lucifer rejected his Grace. The Word, yes. But not his Grace."

Dean slammed the washing machine shut and turned to face the angel. "So she deserved to die?"

"Your view of life is limited." The calmness in his voice--the _indifference_--was maddening. "It would have only been mortal death."

The hunter snorted in irritation and contempt. "Well, aren't you just a sonofabitch?"

Again, Castiel tilted his head to the side. His expression was calm, but there was a trace of bitterness in his tone. "I believe you have already established as much."

"What will happen to her now then? You going to just hunt her down?"

"Not personally." There was no apology in his tone, nor was there room for argument. The angel was merely stating a fact. "That task belong to others now. Even with her Grace returned, she is not fully whole. She still presents too much of a threat to remain free."

The human sneered and shook his head, but said nothing. He turned back to the machine, cranking the dials irritably.

Castiel stared at him silently for a long moment before he spoke again. ". . . You did well, though."

Dean's head whipped around, uncertain he'd heard correctly. "What?"

A small smile played at the other man's lips. "Your plan . . . Playing to Alistair's baser nature and Uriel's prejudices . . . It was very clever."

"That was all Sam," the human replied. He dug out four quarters again and fed them to the change tray on the machine before casting the angel a sidelong glance. "He's good like that--coming up with the plan."

"And you handle execution?"

Dean shrugged uncomfortably, the wording evoking memories he'd rather not focus on. "Something like that." He shoved the quarter-laden tray into the machine, the act providing him with enough focus to remember his previous irritation. He wheeled around to face his companion as the washer sloshed to a start. "And another thing--" The hunter broke off, finally getting a good look at Castiel. "Is that blood?"

The angel looked down at himself and, sure enough, a fine smattering of blood liberally stained the right lapel his graying trench coat. He looked up again, eyes calm and serene. "It's not mine."

The taller man clenched his teeth and narrowed his eyes. Part of him wanted to demand whose blood it was. And the rest of him remembered Uriel's breath, soft and warm on his neck, as he threatened to throw Dean back down into Hell. He shook his head, his annoyance resurfacing. He didn't think they'd really send him back to the Pit--he'd already gambled on it twice now and Heaven hadn't called his bluff--but it pissed him off that they'd think they could hold that over him. That they would hold _Sam_ over him. It wasn't like they didn't have enough problems already.

He glared frowned at the ancient washing machine and held out his hand. "Take everything out of your pockets and give me your coat," he ordered without looking at the angel.

Castiel gave him a blank look even as his hands began to pull an odd assortment of things from his pockets. "Why?"

"You can't just walk around with blood on your clothes, man. It's kind of shady." He waved his hand impatiently. "Come on. You're in luck. This is the special Winchester bleach cycle, especially for bloodstains."

Castiel seemed to consider this for a moment as he dumped the contents of his pockets--ten packs of Sugar in the Raw, a used glow stick, three paperclips, and four crumpled twenty-dollar bills--on the adjacent washing machine. "I am capable of cleaning my own clothes."

Dean rolled his eyes. "Look, it's no skin off my nose. I'm already washing Sam's mess. Might as well add yours to the mix."

The angel quirked his brow at the comment, but handed over his coat without a word. The hunter opened the washer and stuffed it in under the spray of water filling the machine. He dropped the lid closed with a bang and turned from the row of washers to the rows of garish, uncomfortable-looking plastic chairs occupying the center of the room. The bright florescent light overhead seemed to drown out the sunlight that crept in through the front windows and highlighted the poor condition of the seats and floor tiles.

Dean slumped down into a chair that looked on the verge of falling off its row and leveled the other man with a tired look. "So why are you here quoting dead poets to me?"

Castiel eyed the chair at Dean's side somewhat skeptically, clearly not trusting the weathered plastic. The hunter only grinned at the expression and slumped further down in his seat. "Well?"

The angel huffed out a sigh and moved to sit beside the other man. He looked smaller without his coat somehow. And the air around him was intensely warm as he turned to meet Dean's eyes again. "Horatio was a man of reason. He had difficulty believing in what he could not see. "

The human smirked. "You think I'm like Horatio then?"

"You are a skeptic, Dean. And stubborn in your preconceptions."

"Should I be insulted?"

Castiel merely gave him one of those creepily serene smiles and said nothing. Dean frowned slightly and leaned forward, resting his elbows on his knees and crossing his finger for a moment. "How do you know so much about human writing anyway? Isn't that a no-go up there in Heaven?"

"Humans are capable of tremendous beauty. We have always been privy to this, just as we have always been able to observe the horror you have wrought. In your artists and poets and creators--Virgil, Confucius, Michelangelo, and the like--the works of our Father are glorified. _You_ are glorified."

"So you all are just lounging up there in the clouds, watching us all the time?"

A soft chuckle. "I think you overestimate your importance in the Universe. Humans are wondrous and fascinating creatures--the jewel of our Father's creation--but you are not the only things in creation."

"More things on Heaven and in the earth, right?" Dean shook his head and rubbed a hand over his face tiredly without waiting for a response.

The angel watched him silently for a long moment as the hunter seemed to gather his thoughts. Then: "Would you have truly betrayed her?"

The taller man looked over questioningly and watched as Castiel cocked his head to the side curiously. "Anna," he clarified. "If your plan had not worked, would you have truly betrayed her even after you'd lain with her?"

The hunter expression flattened for a moment and he looked back down at the floor, remembering the twist in his stomach when the young woman had translated the angels' message: _"Either Dean Winchester hands over Anna by midnight, or we will cast his soul back into perdition."_ He closed his eyes to quell a shudder. "I'd have gone back to Hell."

It was the truth, but not really an answer.

Castiel leaned forward and he could feel the other man watching him closely. "But for Sam? Would you have betrayed her?"

The human looked over without sitting up. Castiel's eyes were clear and focused again, looking at him--looking _into_ him. "Yeah," he replied without hesitation. "Yeah, I'd have done it."

The angel stared at him for a moment longer and then sat back again. Somehow Dean knew that wasn't the answer he'd wanted, but it was the only one he'd had to give. He looked back at the ancient linoleum between his feet. "He's my brother."

Castiel was silent for a long moment before sighing quietly. "She would be better off if she returned to our Father," he murmured at last. "She was never supposed to be human."

Dean looked up, abruptly feeling tired. Though he'd barely stumbled his way into thirty, he felt closer to seventy; every minute of his time in Hell weighed on him heavily. "Is it really so awful to you guys? Being human?"

The angel shook his head. "Contrary to what you have been told, Dean, we have feelings. We experience joy and pain and love and fear and loss . . . Just not in the same way. We are a part of the Almighty--Light of his Light. It is not a terrible thing to be mortal, but it is not what we were made for. The Eternal cannot be shed like an outgrown skin and mortality is not as easily worn as you might think. I have seen things beyond even your conception, and you have a much broader scope than most of your kind. I have heard the planets sing. Seen stars born and die. I have felt atoms crack apart in a span of eons and seen terrible war waged in the space of a breath. Creatures such as I are not supposed to be mortal."

The hunter sat back, still staring down. "Do you miss it?"

"Miss it?"

"Heaven. It's your home, right? Being down here--crawling around in the dirt with us mere mortals . . ." He turned and fixed the angel with an intent look. "It must suck."

A ghost of a smile twitched over Castiel's lips. "The human world--and humans themselves--are not without their charm. This is my Father's creation. I am . . . honored . . . to have been chosen for this assignment."

"Uriel doesn't seem that honored."

"Uriel was chosen for different reasons than I."

"Because he's a prick?"

"You shouldn't goad Uriel," the angel turned to him again, but the overly intent look was once more absent. "He is a proven soldier, tried and true. He was alive for an age before even I was created. He is not to be trifled with."

"And he's your brother," the hunter finished, watching him closely.

Castiel looked away. "He is. If he is stern or harsh, it is only out of concern for me or the mission."

"And never mind little ole me, right?" Dean made no effort to keep the bitterness from his voice.

"You are more than a tool, Dean," the angel chastised him sharply.

The hunter glared at him in warning. "Stay out of my head."

The two stared at one another for a long moment, gazes tangled together in strangely comfortable contest before Castiel finally looked away with a slight huff. "You think very loudly."

And it wasn't really an apology, but it was as close as he'd get. Dean's couldn't help but quirk his lips slightly and looked back down at the cracked floor beneath him. As much as he wanted to stay pissed at Castiel, he couldn't really. The angel had that affect on him--something about his magical angel hoodoo made it impossible for Dean to really hold a grudge, even if he scared Dean shitless half the time. ... Which was kind of funny because Sam was the exact same way. Especially these days.

The thought made his smile fade and for the two sat in silence, listening to the washing machine and dryers rumble around their loads. His sleepless nights were catching up with him, it seemed, and he badly wanted to take out the flask in his coat pocket. But dealing with Sam's bitchface every time he took a drink was bad enough; he didn't need to see Castiel's version of the expression. It probably wouldn't be so bad if Sam would just _say_ something but . . .

Well, what the hell do you say when you find out your big brother had been the up and coming Torquemada of Hell? And that he'd been good at it? That he'd _liked_ it? _Liked_ Alistair's hand on his--guiding . . . praising--_liked_ watching the flames and blade slice and purge, scream by achingly sweet scream . . .? He snorted quietly and rolled his shoulders.

_You say nothing, that's what. You say nothing and you fuck a demon and you watch your stupid brother throw back shots while the apocalypse comes._

"You think too loudly," Castiel repeated softly. Sadly. And something in his tone made Dean _ache_.

The human cleared his throat and blinked rapidly, forcibly pushing away thoughts of his flask again. He didn't need this shit--not today. Not with everything between him and Sam going to Hell.

He turned away and stared at nothing in particular with unseeing eyes. "Can I . . . Can I ask you something?"

Castiel just kept staring at him. "Yes."

"What do you guys want from me?" Dean turned to look at the other man, brow furrowed slightly in a frown. "I mean . . . why me?"

Castiel didn't look away and it absently occurred to the hunter than the angel's eyes really were _huge_. Big and blue and completely guileless. He wondered if that was the vessel or more angel mojo.

The possessed man tilted his head to the side in that familiar RCA-dog way, just like he had that night in the barn. "There is work that must be done."

Dean sighed loudly and scrubbed a hand through his hair, annoyed. Sometime he couldn't tell if the angel was serious and maybe a little stupid, or if he was just the most infuriating thing on earth and dicking around with him. "Yeah, I got that. But why me? I mean . . . You know . . . You saw what it was like down there. What _I_ was like. And don't say 'because God commanded it' either."

Castiel blinked at him, long and slow, as though that were some sort of response and then turned away to stare at the machines in front of them. "Destiny is not something to be dictated, Dean, and free will is tantamount in human experience." He turned back to the human at his side, head tilted as though listening to another side of the conversation that Dean couldn't hear. "I am not privy to my Father's thoughts and plans. And--even if I were to tell you all I know--it could sway you unfairly. You decisions must be yours and yours alone. I will stand by your side regardless."

The hunter snorted and turned away, irritated by the subterfuge. "Because God commanded it?"

". . . No. Because I want to. We do have free will, Dean. Lucifer could not have Sinned and Anna could not have fallen if we did not."

"So what if God tells you to leave me in my mess and fly back home?" There was a challenge in the question. And--though it didn't come through in his tone--a little bit of fear.

Christ, he needed a fucking drink.

The angel's expression softened. "All others may abandon you, but I will always stand by your side."

A dark smile, devoid of humor, quirked at the corners of the human's mouth and he turned away before it could break free. _Second verse, same as the first._ He'd heard that line a dozen times before. Different variations maybe, but it was still the same lie over and over: his mother's whispered promises, his father's solid, study deceptions, Cassie . . . Hell, even Alistair had whispered it, hungry and blood-drenched, into his ear. Carved it into his soul slice by exquisite slice. And Sam . . . Sam had made the exact same promises, but even by Dean's side, he was a thousand miles away these days.

And Dean was alone.

Yeah. He knew that lie already.

"You haven't been sleeping well. You should rest while you have time."

He hated how the angel could remain so expressionless, but sound so damn _sad_ . . .

_"You don't think you deserve to be saved."_

Dean knew exactly what he deserved, and salvation was not on the list.

He shook his head and sat up straighter, flexing his shoulders slightly to shake off the ever-present weariness. He wished Sam were here. "I gotta put the clothes in the dryer when the cycle's done. Sam'll be here--"

"Sam won't be here for a while yet."

And then there were fingers pressed gently against his forehead.

He jerked back, but the heaviness was already washing over him. "Damnit--"

"Rest, Dean. I will watch over you."

Dean growled in slurred protest, but was gone before he could say anything more. Even without the angel whammy, it was too warm in the Laundromat for him to fight off his exhaustion--the air was too soft with fabric softener--and Castiel's warm presence in the uncomfortable seat beside him was too soothing. And he was so, so tired . . .

Nothing would happen to him here--not in the Laundromat. Not with Castiel here.

He head lolled slightly to the side and came to rest on the angel's shoulder, and if the last thing he knew was gentle, tentative fingers carding through his hair, and if the nightmares seemed to be held at bay by a warm, familiar presence . . . Well, it probably wasn't that big a deal.

**o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o**

Dean awoke with the end of the delicate cycle to find Castiel doing Sudoku beside him. The angel's brow was contorted and his lips were pursed as though the little number-filled blocks held the secrets of the universe. The hunter found himself staring for a moment, a little bit surprised.

Angels. Doing Sudoku.

His gaze flickered back to the dryer across from him--the dryer that had been empty when he'd nodded off.

Doing Sudoku and laundry.

Huh.

He blinked and stretched without preamble, surreptitiously checking the other man's shoulder to make sure he hadn't drooled on him. That would have just been embarrassing.

Castiel did not look away from the puzzle. "Did you sleep well?"

It wasn't really a question, so Dean made a sour face at the angel in response before grabbing the bags from the seat beside him and heading towards the dryers. He had slept better than he had in months actually, but damned if he'd admit that to the guy who'd just angel-roofied him. ". . . You put the clothes in the dryer?"

"You were sleeping."

Dean narrowed his eyes curiously, wondering if this was some sort of weird, celestial apology or something. '_Sorry for being an ass and slipping you a holy Mickey. Your clothes are now Downy soft._' He snorted slightly and began pulling the clothes out of the dryer and neatly rolling them up and packing them into the bags. Castiel was still way better than that fabric softener bear. "So you really came here to watch me sleep, do our laundry, and work on puzzles? . . . And quote dead poets?"

Castiel tilted his head to the side in that weirdly bird-like fashion and watched him with wide, unblinking eyes. "No."

Dean made a skeptical noise and shook out a pair of jeans. Sam would probably bitch at him about wrinkles later, but it wasn't like either of them ever really dressed to impress. And anyway, if Sam was going to lie and stick him with laundry duty while he sneaked off to see his girlfriend, then he could just suck it up and deal with wrinkles in his gigantic freak jeans.

Not that Dean was jealous.

"So why are you here?" he pressed again, rolling the pants up more briskly than necessary.

Castiel sighed and for a moment he looked . . . guilty. It was a strange expression to see on the other's face and Dean felt his stomach fall a bit as it occurred to him that Castiel just might have been procrastinating on purpose. He swallowed hard as the angel set aside the puzzle he'd been working on. "There is an issue, Dean."

He dropped the rolled-up jeans in the bag and turned to fully face the other man. "What? You mean with the seals? We can--"

"No." The angel turned slightly, avoiding his eyes, and Dean felt his face twist slightly in confusion.

"No?" A rolled up salmon pink Abercrombie and Fitch shirt joined the giant jeans in the bag. Sometimes Dean had to wonder if Sam really _was_ gay . . . And where the hell had he gotten enough money during Dean's trip downstairs to afford designer clothes?

"There is an issue with your brother--with Sam."

Dean paused in the middle of balling up a pair of socks and felt a familiar tension settle across his shoulders. _'If you can't save him, you have to kill him . . .'_ He swallowed hard, any vestiges of relaxation from his nap vanishing. He'd kind of expected this eventually to be honest, and he felt more weary than angry. "Is that why you came here, Cas?" He lifted tired eyes to the angel. "Did you come to tell me to kill my brother?"

The angel sighed quietly and stood, gaze half with Dean and half in angel land. "Dean, I know there are things that you don't want to hear about Sam, but you need to listen."

The hunter threw the socks in the bag and cut the angel off with a rough shake of his head, weariness vanishing beneath frustration. It was always the same thing--always the same push and pull with everyone trying to pit him against his brother. And he was sick of it. He shook his head a second time. "You know what? Save it, okay?" He began shoving clothing onto the bag haphazardly. "I already know how this one ends. And I won't hurt Sammy."

"_Dean._" The firm chastisement in his voice made the taller man pause in the middle of shoving a Led Zeppelin tour shirt into his bag, jaw set and body humming with tension. "I'm not asking anything of the sort."

Green eyes narrowed suspiciously. "Come again?"

"I am not asking you to hurt Sam," the angel repeated with intensity, his eyes locked on to Dean like a snake charmer trying to soothe a serpent.

The hunter broke the gaze with a skeptical scoff and resumed haphazardly pulling laundry from the dryers. To hell with the wrinkles. The sooner this conversation was over, the better.

"Will you stop and listen to me for a moment?"

Funny how much a plea could sound like a demand.

_Fuck you_, the hunter snipped in his mind, and viciously wondered if the angel could hear _that_, too.

"It is not difficult to hear you hurling vulgarities," the other man replied icily.

Dean shoved the last item of clothing into the bag and then pulled out the now-clean trench coat. He ignored the angel in favor of snapping the garment straight and glaring at the lapel. The blood was gone of course. Dean was a champion when it came to mixing cleaners to get out bloodstains. He shoved the clean garment at the blond, every line in his body taut with agitation and his green eyes hard as glass.

"Here. I don't want to hear it."

The angel's lips thinned slightly as he stared the hunter down, but he took the coat and shrugged it on with unnatural grace. "No good can come of your blind defensiveness of your brother."

The hunter shouldered the clothes-filled back and turned to the slightly shorter man with a mutinous expression. "You know what, _Cas_? I am _tired_ of listening to you. All I do is listen to you people and all you do is screw me over. I owe you. I get that, okay? But when the hell have you guys ever listened to _me_? Or to Sam? Or, Christ, to Jess or my mother, or any other poor bastard that you all just let the darkness rip apart for that matter? You're fucking hypocrites and we're done talking about Sam."

He turned, bag swinging heavily and stalked towards the entrance.

The angel stared after him for a moment, an odd, pinched expression on his face. "The Lord is your Father, too, Dean, and He has always listened to you. Even when no one else did. Especially when no one else did. The Lord is not the issue here."

"Whatever." The cowbell attached to the door jangled loudly as he shoved it open roughly and stomped out into the parking lot. It was late afternoon and the February sun beat down on the dusty macadam, thin and tired. He walked around the side of the squat, brick building, tense and restless. He could feel his flask in his back pocket, heavy and tempting, and whatever peace his nap seemed to have instilled was gone entirely.

He wanted a drink.

He wanted to hit someone. . . . Preferably the black-eyed mockery of himself that had haunted his dreams ever since that stupid dreamroot case.

_"This is what you're going to become!"_

And it had been right. Dean could feel it: a steady pressure in his head, a film of red over his eyes, how damned _good_ the hilt of a knife felt against his palm. There was a reason he slept with a gun instead of his blade nowadays.

The familiar rustle of feathers made him halt and Dean looked up from glaring at the ground just in time to see Castiel appear in front of him. The angel was frowning, earnest and distressed and desperate in a way that Dean didn't want to deal with, and the hunter clenched his free hand into a fist and barely managed to refrain from punching the blond's pretty, dispassionate face in.

Probably wouldn't go down too well at the moment.

"Go away," he ground out in a voice like broken glass. He pushed past him, shoulder roughly bumping the other man. It was like hitting a brick wall and the angel didn't move a millimeter, but the rough contact made him feel a bit better. And where the hell was Sam? It had been three hours; the sex couldn't be _that_ good.

"The Lord is not at issue here, Dean," the angel repeated, undeterred. "You are. You do not listen. You do not _hear_."

The words stopped Dean in his tracks and a painful, nameless _anger_ swept through him. He turned, fist clenched so tightly it hurt. "Beg your pardon?"

Castiel sighed in obvious irritation and stepped closer, closing the distance and putting Dean between himself and the wall. Cutting off escape routes. "The Lord is speaking to you." And he sounded so _sad_ again that Dean wanted to throttle him.

Dean's back stiffened visibly and he shifted to face him fully, giving the shorter man a look of blatant incredulity. The laundry bag dropped to the dusty ground, forgotten. "What?"

"You do not listen," Castiel repeated. His words were barely a murmur, but they sounded like a roar.

There was a long beat of silence before Dean's face crumpled into a harsh, wrathful expression and his lips pulled back into something that might have been a smile, but was more of a snarl. "God is speaking to me? God is--" he broke off with a growl of frustration and turned sharply, arms crossing over his chest as though he might hit the angel if he didn't restrain himself. He cast the other man a dark, bitter look, expression twisted in anger and poorly concealed self-loathing. "Please. That's bullshit and you and I both know it." His lips twisted in a viciously self-deprecating sneer. "I know how to follow orders, Cas, and I'm damned good at it. I don't think I would have missed your Lord's holy deployment notice."

"Respect, Dean." Castiel's warning fell cold and dangerous between them, shattering on the pavement like winter ice, but the human ignored it with a roll of his eyes.

Castiel pursed his lips in obvious anger and took another step forward. "God is with you, Dean. You too often forget that in your self pity."

"God is with me?" The hunter gaped for a moment, disbelief so evident it was painful for the angel to bear. "_Then where is He, Castiel?_ Do you see Him here? I am elbow-deep in the fucking valley of shadow and I am _**alone**_!"

"You have _never_ been alone," the angel retorted sharply.

Dean took one look at his angry, sincere expression and then bent over slightly and laughed in his face. It was a harsh, bitter bark of sound, devoid of humor, and it seemed to tear at his throat on its way out. He could feel an ugly sneer twisting his lips, but he didn't stop it. It felt too good. Anger--clean, righteous anger--burned through him. And he wasn't inclined to spare anyone who presumed to stand between him and Sam. Not even an angel. "Then where was God when Mom burned? When Jess burned? When Dad died? When Sam died?" His voice dropped low then, mouth moving too quickly and anger burning too brightly to stop himself. "Where was God when _I_ burned, Cas? Where the hell was your God then?"

The silence stretched on between them for an uncomfortably long moment, heavy and dense with things unsaid. And somewhere, in the back of his head, Dean could hear chains singing to the tune of screams and he could taste blood on his tongue.

Castiel looked away first, mouth twisting in distaste at the too-vivid memories of Hell riding high in Dean's mind at the moment--at the remembered pleasure and hunger for destruction that still dogged the human, and the self-loathing and fear that accompanied those memories.

Dean closed his eyes and swallowed, tasting blood and ash. He clenched his fists. _Sam._ And the memories started to fade.

Castiel looked up and his eyes looked shadowed and strangely bruised for a moment. The expression on his face was strange. He took a step closer--too close now--pressing uncomfortably into the hunter's personal space. "You give him too much of yourself."

Dean smiled humorlessly and held his ground. "Who else should I give myself to?"

Castiel said nothing, eyes instead locked unblinking on the other man's face. The question was rhetorical, but the silence drew out too long. And Castiel was far too close. Frowning, Dean leaned away and then his eyes narrowed in a sudden, sharp realization. He knew that look. And he knew why Castiel wasn't responding to him. The angel was staring at him . . . or, more accurately, at his _mouth_.

The hunter had shoved the smaller man away and took three large steps backwards before he quite registered the act. His back hit the brick wall hard. His anger was gone so quickly, the loss left him a little breathless, and something far more unpleasant was moving in to take its place. Dean knew lust. And he knew the look in the other man's eyes well--he'd been seeing it since he was old enough to recognize it. But to see it coming from _Castiel_ of all people . . .

_"You see, he's got this weakness,"_ the memory of Uriel's voice mocked him. _"He **likes** you . . ."_

"Jesus, Cas . . ." A suddenly shaky hand rose and he scrubbed it through his hair. He felt a little ill.

The angel looked away, jaw clenched in anger and a high flush on his cheeks. It was the most human the hunter had had ever seen him look and he didn't have a damned clue what to do about it.

"You are disgusted," Castiel said flatly. He sounded disgusted himself.

Dean winced and raised his hands, feeling weirdly defensive. "I . . . Yes. Well, no . . . I don't . . . Just . . ." He huffed out a sigh and ran a hand back through his hair again, still pressed against the wall as though it offered some sort of an escape. "Christ, Cas. What the hell am I supposed to think?"

Blue eyes flickered back to him, hard and uncompromising. For a moment, Castiel was every inch unfathomable angel. "Nothing," he said firmly. "There is nothing to be concerned about."

Dean grimaced and pushed away from the wall. "Nothing to be concerned about? Christ, man, I _saw_ that. This was . . . I mean . . . This is _not okay_."

Castiel turned, shifting so that he was fully facing Dean again, and focused his entire attention on the hunter. His expression was disturbingly calm. It was more than a little disconcerting. "Why not? Isn't it the same thing you see when you look at Sam?"

Dean shuddered slightly and took another step back, only to realize there wasn't really anywhere for him to go. "_That's_ what this is about, isn't it?" It was more a breath than a question and the hunter couldn't ignore the sinking feeling in his stomach that came with the realization. He and Sam . . .

Castiel's silence was his reply.

Dean looked away and rubbed his eyes, both angry and embarrassed by turns. "It's complicated."

"It is a sin." The angel's voice was barely above a whisper, but the condemnation was loud and clear.

The hunter clenched his jaw and green eyes met blue unflinchingly. "I love him." Uncompromisingly. Unconditionally.

Castiel's eyes flickered, but he stood his ground. "He stands between you and God."

"Then fuck your God." The words were hurled in anger, but the moment they left his mouth, Dean knew they were a mistake.

Something both bright and dark seemed to flare in the angel's eyes and anger and something more (_Jealousy._) danced over his face. He moved faster than a human ever could and Dean had only an instant to register the act before he found himself gripped hard and slammed back into the rough bricks behind him by the front of his jacket. His head rang with the impact. Though he easily had a good inch or two on the angry angel, the hunter suddenly found himself straining to touch the ground, held up but Castiel's impossibly strong grip.

Their eyes met and what he couldn't suppress a shiver at what he saw in the angel's gaze. Gone was any semblance of humanity. Instead, the angel's gaze seemed _massive_, like quicksand, pulling him under until it became hard to breath. All he could see was a Light so bright it made his eyes water and his headache.

_Close your eyes._

He couldn't look away--didn't want to. It was all he could see.

_Dean._ The voice was Castiel's. _Don't look. Close your eyes._

Dean grit his teeth and forced his eyes wide. And there in the Light, he saw something that looked like a shadow.

The angel's eyes slid closed and his grip tightened until the leather squeaked. Dean felt the rough bricks scraping his back as he slid down until his feet touched the ground again, but the angel only seemed to push him harder against the wall, pinning him like a fly to a corkboard. The human shuddered and something close to panic moved through him as he realized it was getting harder to lift his chest to breathe.

His voice shook slightly, but it was more with anger than fear as he ground out, "Let. Me. Go."

Castiel opened his eyes again and they were ice blue, cold with hunger and brittle with anger. He gripped his collar tightly enough to belie the calm expression on his face and leaned in so closely that Dean could smell the scent of coffee on his breath. "You are a creature of carnality." And then he crushed their lips together.

There was nothing gentle about the angel's kiss. It was forceful to the point of violence, more of a conquering of enemy territory than a request. Nevertheless, Dean found a low groan escaping his chest as he leaned in and allowed his mouth to be plundered. His senses wheeled with the experience of Castiel before him, one leg shoved aggressively between Dean's parted thighs, supporting the human as his trench coat fluttered around them in the breeze like a flag of surrender. He could smell the soft, dry scent of feathers even though he couldn't see or feel them. It mingled oddly with the scents of ink, dust, eucalyptus, and fabric softener that clung to the body gripping him tightly. Beneath his hands, Castiel's biceps were hard and firm--unyielding--and the angel tasted of coffee and tart cherry pie and something else . . . something light and beautiful that Dean suddenly craved like air.

He couldn't breath--couldn't think--and when one of Castiel's hands suddenly let go of the collar of his jacket and grabbed at his shoulder, right over the brand, a wave of _want_ hit Dean so hard that his knees literally buckled, dropping him down hard to press against the steady thigh between his legs. He tore his mouth free of the angel's with a stuttered groan. "G--God...!"

"No," Castiel whispered sharply, lifting him slightly and shoving him hard against the wall. His breath burst from him as though he'd been punched and another wave of need rose up in Dean at the rough handling.

"Just Castiel," the angel muttered before sealing their lips together again and stealing away any additional blasphemies.

Dean moaned, not really caring who the hell the other man was at the moment, as long as those finger kept digging into his scarred shoulder _just. like. **that**._

_**DeanOursMine...**_

The thought was loud and painful and just plain _wrong_--more a sudden blaring of sensations and complex, indecipherable emotions than a true thought--and the hunter tried to jerk his head back, but, trapped between Castiel's mouth and the cold brick wall, there was nowhere to go.

_No._ His own counter to Castiel's voice in his mind was pitifully small.

Castiel hummed softly and sweetly and something like . . . Light--all light, every light, _the_ Light--exploded in Dean's mind. He arched up hard against his captor, fingers digging into Castiel's biceps hard enough to bruise, and screamed into their shared kiss. The hum, burningly inhuman despite the human tone, made his eyes tear up as it vibrated through him. It felt like someone was pouring boiling hot water into him, scalding and drowning and cleansing him in the same motion. He was dying. He was painfully alive. He was exploding and on fire and shrinking and expanding all at the same time and he couldn't breath and he could think and everything hurt and felt so good and--and--

_DeanOursMineDeanOursMineDeanOursMineDeanOursMineDeanOursMineDeanOursMineDeanOursMineDeanOursMineDeanOursMineDeanOursMineDeanOursMineDeanOursMineDeanOursMineDeanOursMine--_

_Castiel..._

_**Let me go.**_

Dean came hard as the taste of blood flooded his mouth and the Light and the voice vanished, blotted out in a wave of pain/pleasure/fear/need so strong that everything else spiraled away into darkness.

When he opened his eyes again, it could have been a minute later, or it could have been an hour. He didn't know and couldn't summon the energy to care. Castiel was still bracing him against the wall--still far too deep in his personal space--and watching him with dispassionate serenity. His release was sticky and cooling and wholly disgusting in his pants. Dean shuddered again, a garbled protest leaving him as an echo of pleasure moved through him from Castiel's continued grip on his arm.

The angel leaned forward so that their foreheads were a hair's breadth from touching and forced Dean to meet his eyes. "_Here_--" his grip on the human's shoulder tightened in time with his whisper-- "is where divinity laid its hands on you. _Here_--" another squeeze from Castiel, another whimper from Dean-- "is where I held you fast while Hell itself tore after us to regain you. _Here_--"

"Stop..."

"Is where I claimed you for Glory and for God."

His grip was so tight, Dean was amazed that his arm hadn't fallen off yet.

"Damnit--" Dean tried to move, but the motions were weak and sluggish. "Cas--"

Castiel cut him off by leaning in a bit more so that their lips brushed lightly. "And _**here**_ is where I will claim my spoils of war."

Dean jerked his head back, slamming it into the wall and using the pain to ground himself and force back the heat still racing through him. _Cas_ . . .

He could feel the press of the angel's mind in his head, foreign and _massive_, and the heavy force of it brought back bright, burning memories of LightLightLight all around and inside him as this _thing_ wrenched him from his chains and pressed and forced--

The human gasped, eyes watering with the suddenly clear memory of Castiel's unyielding arms holding him tight in Hell. Castiel's lips pressed against him, washing away Alistair's taint. Castiel's Grace, pushing, driving, and insisting, drowning and reshaping him and pushing out out out . . .

_**Sammy.**_

_**Stop!**_ "Stop!"

The mental shout and shove accompanied a physical one and suddenly that iron grip released him and the angel (_blue blue eyes, the scent of feathers, the taste of sweet coffee_) was wheeling back as though Dean had shoved him away with far, far more force than he had. Dean slumped heavily against the wall, panting and aching and shaking, and stared at the other man in wild disbelief. He could still taste him in his mouth. He could still feel his Light scorching its way through him.

Castiel stared at him, blue eyes huge and shadowed in his face, the blue only a thin electric ring around a sea of wide black pupil. His skin was white and his cheeks flushed. He looked like a wild thing.

He looked like a demon.

"You . . ." Dean wiped his mouth heavily with a shaking hand, trying to get a grasp on the situation. In his memory, buried somewhere beneath an ocean of fire, blood, and screams, he could still feel nonexistent lips brush his equally nonexistent ear. _"Come with me. DeanOursMineChild, come with me."_

Suddenly--stupidly--he really, really wished his brother were here.

Dean pushed himself up from the wall and hoped he looked stronger than he felt. Hoped he looked half as _pissed off_ as he felt.

"You did that before." His voice was rough with anger and raw with exposure. He felt violated in a way he couldn't even begin to name and the only reason he didn't punch the angel in the face was that he didn't think he could make it those three steps without falling over. He wiped his mouth again roughly, pulling harshly at the skin in a futile attempt to push away the tingling he could feel on his lips. "What _the **hell**_ was that?"

"Dean . . ." The angel seemed to shudder and looked away, unable to hold that outraged gaze. "You are more than your brother's keeper, Dean. And your life is worth more than the sum of your service to Sam."

"You kiss me--or do whatever the hell you were just doing to me--and then you . . . You just--" Words failed Dean for a moment and he hissed wordlessly. "You have no right, no _right_--" His hands balled into fists and he took a step forward. He could feel his cold release sticking to him. It made his stomach turn even as his body seemed to tighten in a frighteningly familiar way.

Castiel seemed to regain a measure of himself in the interim, straightening his loose tie and disheveled cuffs with hands that barely seemed to shake at all. He turned back to Dean, a semblance of normalcy returning to his eyes. "Watch and pray, that ye enter not into temptation," the angel quoted, still looking flushed and breathless. "The spirit indeed is willing, but the flesh is weak."

Dean stared at him, his anger a living thing between them. "You son of a bitch--"

Castiel flinched, but still didn't look the least bit chastised. Instead, his electric blue eyes narrowed and he turned away to look towards the slowly sinking sun. A muscle in his cheek twitched as he clenched his jaw. "Do you know why Uriel was sent here?"

Dean swallowed hard, but couldn't bring himself to look away from the other man (_angel_)--not with traces of that damned Light still burning through him like ozone. "Why?" His voice sounded as broken and off-kilter as he felt.

"My brothers think that my interactions with you are affecting my judgment, Dean." Castiel turned back to him and the shadows of the waning light suddenly fell over his face. They were different than the black shadows of wings that Dean had once seen. They were frightening. Sinister. The angel's lips (_taste like coffee_) twisted in what could have been a smile--could have been, but wasn't. "I think they may be right."

Dean clenched his jaw, biting the inside of his cheek to keep from saying something stupid. He bit down until he tasted fresh blood joining the copper and coffee taste of the kiss lingering on his tongue.

"I . . . _want_, Dean. I . ." He broke off with a slightly shuddered breath, blue eyes staring at some point beyond Dean that only he could see. "It is a sin." At his side, his hand--the hand that had so recently clutched the human's shoulder and held him tight--opened and closed almost compulsively.

Dean shivered when he saw that the motion was moving in time to the throbbing moving through his body. His forced himself to stand, hating the shakiness of his limbs and the faint tremor in his voice. "What do you want from me, Castiel?"

The angel turned his head to spear him with that uncomfortably piercing gaze. _Everything_, his eyes seemed to whisper. But when he spoke, his voice was all cold, gravelly purpose: "Enter not into temptation."

A sneer twisted Dean's lips before he could stop it and suddenly righteous indignation flooded him. The taste of it washed away Castiel's lingering heat and strengthened his resolve. "Hypocritical much?"

"I did not mean with me."

Dean stiffened, anger burning away like morning mist. ". . . What?"

Castiel tilted his head to the side. "We knew of Hell. We knew of Sam's relationship with Ruby. Did you really think we also did not know about you and Sam?"

"Sam is . . ." The human swallowed hard and shook his head. "I _love_ my brother, Cas."

"But not as you should, Dean."

"And if we don't stop?" He stood a little taller, pulling his height in as though it were a real advantage. "What then?

"The Lord's love is not about doing whatever you would like. There are _consequences_. God will always love you. But He will also punish you. His Will is absolute."

"All in the name of the greater good, right?" he sneered. "Your precious fucking plan?"

"Dean . . ." The warning was plain in Castiel's voice, but the hunter ignored it.

He was sick of this. Sick of getting pushed around. Sick of _never having anything he did be enough_. He shook his head and cut the angel off with a rough swipe of his hand. "No. You know what? I am getting damned tired of you people holding him over my head. You want my help? Then you fucking deal with me on the level. No more threats and no more blackmail."

Castiel's jaw clenched and his nostrils flared, a nerve clearly struck. He didn't move closer to Dean again, though. If anything, he seemed to pull away--to contain himself more. "The Lord is not a cheap crossroads demon to be bartered with."

"Then throw me back into the pit!" he shouted in frustration, arms thrown wide in offering. It was hard to breath--hard to think. He wanted to hit something. He wanted to _rage_. This wasn't _fair_. "At least down there I knew where I stood. Stop threatening my brother to get to me. You stone-hearted sons of bitches are no better than Alistair."

Castiel flinched. "We serve the Lord."

"Well, I don't serve anyone," Dean ground out in response.

"Not even yourself, it would seem." While his voice was free of contempt, there was something harsh and accusing in the angel's gaze.

The human stilled and forced himself not to reach for his piece. There was no hiding the threat of violence in his voice. "What?"

"Tell me, Dean," the angel took a step closer, but then seemed to think better of it. The hesitation didn't stop him from speaking though. "How long will you hide in your brother's shadow? How long will you allow your obligations to him to smother your Light?"

"I am not _obliged_ to Sam," he snapped hotly in return. "Sam is my brother. My blood. My family. I walked willingly into Hell for him. I would do anything for Sam. Anything. Do you think anything you say to me can shake that?"

"We do not seek to take you from him, only to end this perversion--"

"There is _no end!_ No middle ground--not with us. This is what we are."

"And that is why you will lose him," the angel whispered sadly. "Because you cannot deny him."

"I'm not . . ." he floundered for a moment, thrown off by the angel's rapid transition. "I'm not going to lose Sam," he snapped fiercely. _"I can't lose you again, Dean."_ "We're doing fine."

The look in Castiel's eyes called him a liar. Dean looked away and closed his eyes.

_"Just . . . Just don't give up on me, man. Don't let me go."_

Anger and fear churned in him and he wondered just how much Castiel and his brothers thought they knew. He wondered at the darkness he sometimes saw in his brother's eyes--the flash of yellow that he didn't (_could not have_) seen that day by the Impala. He wondered at Sam's desperate grip on him in the darkness, and the way Ruby's eyes tracked his brother across the room.

"I'm not going to lose Sam," he repeated in a stronger voice. He could feel the angel's full attention shift to him again and met the gaze head-on this time, without flinching. If Heaven wanted to read his mind that damned much, let them. He wasn't ashamed of his brother and he damned sure wasn't afraid of him. Sam had been the only thing he'd had to hold onto in Hell. He'd remembered Sam even when the only reason he knew his own name was because Alistair's filthy voice (_kniveshandsmouthblood_) whispered it in his ear every day. He wasn't about to lose Sam now.

Castiel's eyes darkened at whatever he saw in Dean's mind and the hunter tensed, prepared this time for a second assault. But the angel did not move. Instead he shook his head wearily again, looking tired and bizarrely human, as though he had not had Light pouring out of his cracks and spilling into Dean mere minutes ago. Castiel took another step back, further removing himself from Dean's personal space.

"He is not fully human, Dean," the angel whispered after a long moment. "He is tainted. It is not wholly his fault, but it is true nonetheless."

"He is _mine_," the hunter hissed back in response, eyes blazing. His anger was something hard and frightening, tapping into a terrifying possessiveness he'd never known he'd had. He'd bought Sam with his own soul and paid for him in sweat and blood and tears. It had been all he'd had, all his life and all that time in Hell--_SamSamSammySam_--and he was not about to let some unknowable God who'd never done him any favors until He wanted something take Sam away from him. He _wouldn't_ break his brother's heart--not for God. Not even for (_Lightcoffeesweetsafetyfeatherswarmth_) Castiel.

The angel narrowed his eyes as though reading Dean's thoughts. "You cannot save him like this." Sorrow colored his voice. "Sam is his own man. And you are the Lord's."

"And you're what?" the human sneered, the memory of the other man's lips pressed to his still strong. "My holy consolation prize?"

Castiel sighed softly and looked away. "I should not have done that." Now the regret appeared in his eyes, vibrant and shimmering. It turned them the color of the ocean. He clenched his fist again, looking distressed. "It was . . . Not right."

For a moment, Dean stared at him, anger slowly melting. He hated the angel for a moment--hated him for constantly turning the world on its head, for constantly threatening them. . . But it was hard to hold all that anger when Castiel was so obviously undone and there were still traces of LightLightLight thrumming through him and the feel of unyielding arms bearing him up and away from fire and sulfur and blood in his memory. The hunter humphed in disgust, both with himself and with the man in front of him. "Anna was right about you, wasn't she?"

Castiel looked up, shadows in his blue eyes. He looked weirdly lost.

"You don't really know, do you?" he clarified, holding the angel's gaze. He paused for a moment, scrambling to hold onto his righteous anger only to feel it slipping between his fingers and leaving weariness in its wake. ". . . What it's like to be human? You don't . . . _feel_ things like we do."

Castiel stared at him hard, face expressionless even as darkness clouded his features again. His hands twitched towards fists once more, reminiscent of his talk of _wants_.

Dean leaned back slightly and sighed, feeling hunted. Anna had been right in some ways, but wrong in others. They weren't human, but they weren't emotionless either. This angel, at least, felt plenty. Maybe he just felt it too much.

"This is my test, as well as yours," Castiel murmured at last. He seemed to have to force his hands to unclench.

Dean looked down towards the dusty pavement--anything to avoid that gaze--and his face twisted in disgust. "Your God is fucking selfish, Cas," he whispered harshly to the ground. He braced himself, half expecting the angel to retaliate, but when he looked up again, Castiel was gone.

The human's legs finally gave out and he slumped down to the ground next to the laundry bag, his head impacting hard against the wall behind him. "Figures."

A dust devil in the distance was his only reply.

When Sam returned twenty minutes later, Dean was standing again and leaning heavily on the wall, his back to the road and his brother. His lips were still slightly kiss-swollen and red and his shoulder aching and bruised. It would be just one more thing for them to not talk about. One more thing to ignore while the rift between them grew like the Mariana Trench.

"Dean?" Sam slammed the car door too hard as he got out. "Hey, Dean? . . . Are you okay, man? Why didn't you wait inside? It's like 40 degrees out here."

_Don't slam my doors, bitch._ The words wouldn't come out, though. The hunter ignored the feel of the taller man behind him--_No smell of soap and shampoo this time, just Sammy with that hint of sulfur_--and closed his eyes.

He'd promised Sam he wouldn't give up on him, but more and more he felt like the one being left behind. It was a feeling that was achingly familiar.

"Dean?"

A hand gripped his shoulder--the unbranded shoulder--and it felt so different from the angel's touch that Dean had to suppress a shudder. He looked over, green eyes meeting worried hazel silently. Sam always looked worried these days. Or angry.

Castiel's condemnations twisted around his heart like a snake.

_Don't let me go_, Sam had pleaded that strange morning in the motel when Dean had awoken aching and tangled in the strong safety of his brother's limbs. And the most fucked up thing about it all was that Dean just wanted to lean against his brother and whisper, '_I won't . . . just take me with you_.'

He turned away from that concerned gaze, unable to respond, and closed his eyes against the bleeding sky. His head was bowed and his shoulders were a strong, sharp line against the sunset, like a man awaiting execution.

"Dean . . .?"

"I'm good, Sammy." His scarred shoulder throbbed and he forced himself to smile, all bright lies and sharp edges. Sam did not look convinced. "Everything's fine." He pushed himself off the wall and stepped away from the support. And away from Sam. He was tired. His head hurt. And right now, all he wanted was his car, his music, his brother, and the open road.

Sam caught his eye as he picked up the bag of clean, wrinkled clothes. The bitchface was on again, now with that new dark undertone that had made Dean's skin crawl those first few weeks after Hell. Now it was just one more shade of Sammy. He met the other man's eyes. Tried not to think of Castiel's instead. "I'm good, man."

_Just . . . take me with you._

And damned if he even knew whom he was talking to anymore.

**o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o**


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